Sleeping Dragons 00 - The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones
by Soledad
Summary: Pilot episode to the SD series. How did Ianto end up as the new TW leader? Read and find out. WARNING: Not for Gwen fans.
1. Chapter 1: Shepherdless

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Title:** The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones

**Author:** Soledad

**Fandom:** Torchwood AU, with inevitable elements of Dr. Who.

**Genre: **Action-adventure, Angst, Drama, Romance – take your pick.

**Rating:** General to Teens, for most parts.

**Disclaimer: **Dr. Who and Torchwood – settings and characters – belong to the BBC. I am just borrowing them. No copyright infringement intended and no money made.

**Timeline:** Right before Season 2 for Torchwood. Spoilers for the 3rd series Dr. Who finale "Utopia/The Sound of Drums/The Last of the Time Lords".

**Series:** Pilot episode for the Alternate 2nd Season series, "Sleeping Dragons".

**Summary:** Jack is gone, and the rest of the Torchwood Three team must see how they manage without him.

**Note:** Several different timelines give several different dates when Tosh, Owen or Ianto were recruited for Torchwood. I chose the one that fit the story best, so please, don't start arguing with me over that point. Thanks.

**WARNING:** This is not a Gwen-friendly story. Nothing I ever write will be. If that bothers you, please hit the Back button, now – that would spare us both a lot of anger.

* * *

**Chapter 01 - Shepherdless**

More than a week had passed since Abaddon had emerged in all its dark glory, like some bizarre imitation of King Kong, towering over the city of Cardiff, killing everybody unfortunate enough to fall under its shadow.

A week since Jack had seen no other choice than to go out and offer himself to the monstrous creature like an all-you-can-eat buffet.

A week, for which he had been lying in the morgue, grey and still and cold. Dead. Jack Harkness, who had always been so vibrant, so full of life, was dead.

It was not _right_, Ianto thought, wandering around the Hub and picking up debris mindlessly. Jack was not _meant_ to be dead.

It had been a week since they, the team he had hand-picked over the years, had ganged up against him, betrayed him and killed him. Granted, it had been Owen who had actually pulled the trigger, but they had been in this together.

_All_ of them.

They had all agreed that the Rift had to be opened. They had all trusted the fake images – generated by the enigmatic Bilis Manger for that exact purpose – more than their own leader, who had known it better and had warned them repeatedly. Standing in Jack's office and holding onto his greatcoat as if it had been his lifeline, Ianto could remember the argument vividly.

"Did he say Emergency Protocol One?" Tosh had asked. "And how come I don't know about it?"

She had sounded hurt rather than angry. Unlike Gwen, she never considered it her God-given right to be told _all_ Torchwood secrets. But she had probably thought she would have earned the right to be told such important things by now.

Apparently, she had been wrong – and it clearly hurt her.

"The information is buried very deeply in the Archives," Ianto remembered himself saying. "It's the last resort. A contingency created by the people who built Torchwood. To fully open the Rift, if nothing else would work."

"We can actually do _that_?" Tosh had been stunned.

Jack had not answered right away. He'd seemed surprised that _Ianto_ of all people would be in possession of such confidential knowledge. Ianto was still a bit insulted by _that_. He'd been a Torchwood One Archivist, for God's sake, what had Jack expected from him? To be a simple filing clerk?

"It's never been used," Jack had finally told Tosh. "With good reason. Torchwood sits on top of the Rift. Open it, and this is the first building to go."

Ianto could still feel the annoyance he'd felt hearing that lame excuse. What importance could Torchwood possibly have when the existence of the whole planet was at stake?

"I _would_ make the sacrifice," he'd hissed. "Wouldn't you?"

In the end, Jack had proved to be right, of course. The opening of the Rift _hadn't_ got all the previous problems undone; it had unleashed Abaddon and forced Jack, who had barely returned to life after Owen had shot him, to sacrifice himself. Again.

And this time he hadn't just bounced back as if nothing had happened.

His first resurrection had not truly surprised Ianto. He'd known about Jack's immortality for years. After all, Headquarters had known about it, and what Headquarters knew, Ianto knew, too, especially if it concerned alien life.

Jack _had_ been registered as an alien life form at Headquarters. "The freak of Cardiff" they had called him.

That he'd chosen _not_ to share this piece of information with his current team was something that always confused Ianto. Even though he knew that Tosh had realized it some time ago, and that Gwen was in the secret as well, having witnessed Suzie killing Jack.

Owen, on the other hand, had _not_ known. And he had still been desperate enough to get Diane back to shoot Jack, in order to get his retina print, so that they could set Emergency Protocol One in motion. Even knowing that Jack would come back, Ianto still wasn't sure he'd ever be able to forgive their doctor.

Or that Owen would ever be able to forgive himself, for that matter. Especially now that Jack seemed to have died for good. It had been more than a week…

At first, they had all been too numb with grief and guilt to question Gwen's dogged refusal to leave Jack' side, but as time had gone on, Ianto felt his resentment towards her growing. By now, he was downright pissed. What gave her the right to usurp that position at Jack's side? Didn't she have a good, long-suffering man at home to attend to? A man whom she supposedly loved so much that she would open the Rift, end the word – and _kill Jack_! – to bring him back? Why was she not at home, taking care of her boyfriend? Why did she remain glued to Jack's side, effectively hindering the rest of the team to say their good-byes?

Was it guilt, for having practically led the rebellion that had ultimately caused Jack's death? Or did she want to rub in their faces, especially in Ianto's face, that she had such a special relationship with Jack?

After all, hadn't Jack chosen _her_ to accompany him when he'd gone out to face Abaddon?

For his part, Ianto thought that Jack had chosen Gwen because she was _expendable_. Torchwood would have had a hard time to go on without Tosh's technical genius or Owen's medical expertise… or even his, Ianto's extensive knowledge about the Archives. Not to mention the fact that without him, they'd never be able to gain access to Headquarters' digital database. He was the only one who knew all the codes and passwords.

But what had Gwen ever contributed, in all her time working for Torchwood, except pissing off the police in her lame attempts to play liaison and thus making cooperation with the local authorities even more complicated? As if Jack's arrogance hadn't caused enough problems in the first place…

Of course, Ianto readily admitted that he wasn't entirely without prejudice when it came to Gwen-bloody-Cooper (as Suzie had so adequately nicknamed her). Frankly, it would have been hard to be fair to someone who considered him either her personal servant or simply part of the furniture. And then there were her less than subtle attempts to get into Jack's pants.

Ianto was an old-fashioned guy in the heart of his hearts. He believed in honesty, fidelity, and commitment. He could not understand why someone with a long-term partner – who worshipped the ground she was walking on – felt it necessary to cheat on said partner. And yet Gwen had been shagging Owen (until Diane's appearance, after which Owen had come to his senses and dropped her like a hot potato) and did her best – or would it be her worst? – to crawl into Jack's bed, too. Had tried her damnedest since she'd first set foot into the Hub.

The ironic thing was that Ianto knew for the fact that Jack had never touched Gwen _that_ way. Jack had _respected_ Gwen's relationship with Rhys, way more than Gwen herself. But that didn't make _Ianto_ feel any better. It seemed only to prove Owen's point: that he had only been a part-time shag for Jack.

Would he otherwise have fallen for the other, the real Jack Harkness as hard as a schoolboy at his first crush? During the last week Tosh had found the time to tell him everything that had happened in the past. She felt that he had the right to know, and Ianto was grateful, even though it broke his heart.

There had doubtlessly been a great deal of hero worship on _their_ Jack's part, and there could be no doubt that the real Captain Jack Harkness most likely deserved it. He _had_ been a hero. But that didn't change the fact that Jack had only returned to their time because duty called.

He had not come back for Ianto. He had possibly completely forgotten about Ianto's very existence.

And now he was lying in the morgue, dead, shielded by Gwen from everyone else, and Ianto couldn't even speak his farewells. It was almost too much to bear. Losing Jack, now that he had finally begun to overcome the loss of Lisa, the loss of all his friends at Canary Wharf…

Jack had given him purpose, after he had lost what was still there from Lisa. What was he supposed to do, now that Jack was gone, too?

He took Jack's greatcoat from the coat rack behind the desk (he had advanced from the main Hub area to cleaning the office, not that it would have needed cleaning, just to occupy himself with some blessedly mindless task), and buried his face in the thick wool. It still held Jack's unique scent; those blasted fifty-first century pheromones that could make him weak-kneed, even now.

He didn't even realise when his tears had started to fall.

* * *

He couldn't tell afterwards how long he'd been standing there, crying into Jack's coat like the heroine of some overdone melodrama, when Tosh knocked on the glass door.

"Ianto? I need your help, I'm trying to fix the Rift manipulator again, but without the necessary codes…" she trailed off apologetically.

Ianto nodded. She was right, of course. This wasn't the time to wallow in self-pity – or in self-recriminations, for that matter. They had a great deal of damage control to do, and only the two of them had the necessary knowledge to actually do so. Tosh had the technical know-how, and _he_… he knew _all_ the codes and passwords.

Between the two of them, even with Jack dead and Suzie gone, they _were_ Torchwood. When it came down to the basics, neither Owen nor Gwen did really count, no matter how loud and obnoxious they could be at times – well, practically most of the time.

At least Owen's medical skills were useful, and he'd gained a great deal of experience when it came to alien life forms, but without the two of them, even he would have been completely helpless.

"All right," Ianto said, forcing a calmness he didn't truly feel and would probably never feel again upon himself. "Show me what you've got."

He found that while the Rift manipulator had been badly damaged by their delusional attempt to open the Rift fully, it wasn't entirely beyond help just yet. It would be a hell of a job without Suzie's technical skills, but it was at least doable – in theory anyway.

"I'll have to dig out the original construction plans from the Historic Archives, and we'll probably have to manufacture a lot of the spare parts somehow, but we ought to be able to repair it eventually," Ianto decided. "We might need to get some help with it, though. We don't really have the right equipment here."

"I hope you don't intend to involve UNIT in any way," Tosh replied darkly. "In the second they figure out what we've done, we'll all end up in the same prison I had been kept until Jack bailed me out of it. Trust me, that's not something I'd want for any of us. Not even for Saint Gwen at her most annoying."

Ianto knew what she meant and agreed completely.

"Actually, I was thinking of Sir Archibald," he said, adamantly refusing to simply call the head of Torchwood Glasgow _Archie_ as Jack had preferred to do. "Torchwood Two might be just an office now, but they have the most amazing technology collecting dust in their storerooms. And Sir Archibald is technically savvy, no matter what Jack might think… _might have thought _about him."

"Doesn't he report to UNIT, though?" Tosh asked worriedly.

Ianto shook his head. "No more than we do; actually, even less so. Jack counted as belligerent, but Sir Archibald is considered eccentric to the extreme. He decided that no-one at UNIT was trustworthy after the Brigadier's retirement, and simply refused to send them any more reports."

"And they accepted that?" Tosh said in surprise.

"Apparently, this was filed away as another one of his personality quirks. Like insisting to wear a kilt all the time. UNIT believes Torchwood Two to be insignificant, its major function being to watch out for the Loch Ness monster. Sir Archibald uses that cover to know everything that is there to know about Torchwood _and_ UNIT. Appearances aside, he is a force to be reckoned with; and fortunately, he happens to like me."

"Let me guess: he's a coffee addict," Tosh smiled thinly. Ianto nodded.

"That, too. But he's grateful that I've overhauled his archives a year ago, when Jack lent me to Torchwood Two."

"I see," Tosh paused. "Ianto, does Archie know who you really are? _What_ you used to do at Headquarters?"

Ianto gave her a sharp look. "And how would _you_ know about that? I haven't even told Jack that little detail."

"From Trevor Howard," Tosh confessed. "As you probably know, I used to have a… a little romance with Rajesh Singh, right before the Battle of Canary Wharf, and Trevor was his assistant at that time. After the Battle, he told me about the Archivists and why they were so vital for Headquarters – in case one of them needed help. It turns out you were the only one who survived, but I did what little I could do for you."

Ianto stared at her, his mind whirling furiously.

"The text messages," he then said tonelessly. "_You_ were the one sending them. _You_ helped me to get this job!"

Tosh nodded modestly.

"I knew that sooner or later we'd need somebody with your knowledge," she said. "And besides, I never understood Jack's rabid hatred towards Headquarters. Granted, they made mistakes, but who doesn't?"

"Neither have I," Ianto admitted. "There might be a personal motivation behind it, but as per usual, Jack never found it necessary to enlighten any of us – unless Gwen knows something about it."

He could not quite filter the bitterness he still felt about the privileged treatment of Gwen out of his voice, and Tosh could not blame him for that. She felt the same half the times. But at least she hadn't been Jack's lover.

"I seriously doubt it," she answered dryly. "Would she know anything, she'd have rubbed it in our faces already."

"Most likely," Ianto allowed and squatted down next to the column hiding the Rift manipulator to pick up some damaged machine parts. "We'd better collect all the parts, no matter in how many pieces or how twisted out of shape they are, so that we can compare them with the original blueprints. Can you take this from me?"

Tosh reached out helpfully to do so… then she dropped the twisted, sooty piece of metal with a loud _clank_, her eyes widened, and she run across the entire working area with a happy shriek.

Following her path with his eyes, Ianto almost swooned when he saw Gwen enter the Hub… hand in hand with _Jack_!

* * *

Jack stepped away from Gwen – who was clinging to his hand with all her might – and opened his arms. Tosh threw herself into his embrace, not doubting for a moment that he would catch her. They held each other in a tight hug for long moments. Long enough for Ianto to stand up and head over to them.

The positive shock of seeing Jack alive again carried him half the way, but then he slowed down, not quite sure about his welcome. Finally, just a step or two from Jack, he stopped entirely and held out a hand in an awkward manner. Perhaps Owen _had_ been right, after all. Perhaps he _had_ just been a diversion for Jack, to help him keep his hands from Gwen, whom he had considered untouchable because of her stable relationship.

Jack released Tosh. Their eyes met over her head for a lifetime or two. Ianto's hand, forgotten, was still stuck out in that awkward angle. Then Jack suddenly grabbed him and pulled him in. The scent of his warm, _living_ body would have been enough for Ianto to swoon in earnest.

But it did not end like that. Now Jack took his face in those big hands and kissed him on the mouth soundly, in front of the two women. It was a long, lingering kiss, full of sorrow and promises… and forgiveness. If he could, Ianto would have let himself fall and drown in the sensation.

Their moment was interrupted all too soon – by a loud _thud_. Extracting himself from Jack's arms with great reluctance, Ianto saw that Owen had come in while he was… _distracted_ and dropped the kit he had been carrying down to the floor. He was staring at them, with his mouth hanging literally open.

Ianto discretely stepped out of the way, joining the two women in the background. Owen was still staring at Jack, at the man he'd killed a week ago. His mouth was twitching, his Adam's apple bobbling as he was trying to form coherent words… and failed.

"I…" was all that he could get out.

Jack watched his struggle for a moment; then he walked over to him.

"I forgive you," he said simply, seriously; then he grabbed Owen, too, and hugged him like a child, while Owen cried. Great, wracking sobs shook his thin body as he tried to cleanse himself from his guilt… the prodigal son in his father's arms.

Ianto couldn't remember having _ever_ seen Owen Harper cry. Not even after Diane had chosen to leave them, to try her luck with the Rift again, in the hope that she would find a way back home.

When Owen's sobs finally died down, Jack released him, patted him on the back gently, and then looked at the others.

"I don't know about you, but I've gone for more than a week without any caffeine input," he said. "Any chance to get a decent coffee in this place?"

"I'm sure Ianto can be persuaded to work some coffee magic," Gwen said with condescending sweetness.

"I could, if there were any coffee beans left," Ianto replied curtly.

His joy over Jack's return was fading rapidly. He was getting truly, honestly pissed off again. He was fed up with Gwen bossing him around, with her practically annexing Jack and separating him from the others. From _him_.

"Then you wouldn't mind doing the coffee run, would you?" Gwen asked sweetly.

"Actually, we could all use some fresh air," Tosh interfered hurriedly, seeing the murderous gleam in Ianto's eyes and recognizing it for what it was. "Why don't we all go to Costa's and bring coffee and biscuits for everyone?"

"That's a good idea, Tosh," Gwen jumped at it before Jack could have answered. "Jack and I will just be waiting here for you."

Owen shrugged; he was just relieved to have Jack back and didn't mind Gwen fawning over him too much. Tosh grabbed Ianto's arm, pulling him with them – right until the tourist office. There she let go of him.

"Go back and fight for your territory," she ordered. "Don't let her stake her claim without resistance. _Your_ claim is older; stick to it, for God's sake!"

* * *

Ianto was less than certain about having any claim at all where Jack's affections were concerned, but he followed Tosh's suggestion nonetheless – well, sort of. He did not go back to the Hub, but he _did_ switch on the security screen in the tourist office, calling up the feed from the camera watching Jack's office.

The sight, sadly, was no surprise for him; it was one he had seen countless times before. Jack was sitting behind his desk, his greatcoat on, going through the files on the desk with a frown. Files about the damage done to the Hub. Files about the repairs already done (a very small pile). Files about the repairs still needing to be done (a much higher pile). Files about the victims of Abaddon (a depressingly high pile).

Reports that Ianto had put together with painstaking accuracy, as if some tiny part of him would have hoped to discuss them with Jack, after all, against all hope. Like they had always done.

Only that this time, it wasn't him who was sitting on the edge of Jack's desk. It was Gwen, assuming some wannabe-Lolita pose of what she had probably thought would be endearing. She had even bound her hair into two ridiculous ponytails above her ears like an eight-year-old. On a woman of her age, they looked pitifully stupid, although she had probably wanted to go for 'cute'.

Which was kinda hopeless, going with that badass black leather attire she was wearing.

"What's happened to the Rift?" she asked. "We haven't had another alarm since… well, since _then_."

"It closed up when Abaddon was destroyed," Jack replied absently, preoccupied with the reports. "But it's gonna be more volatile than ever. There's a reason why we ain't supposed to mess with the Rift manipulator, you know."

Wonder of wonders, Gwen accepted _that_ without further argument; for now. She just sat there, with what Ianto secretly called the 'blowfish expression' on her face, apparently thinking very hard about something.

"The visions we had," she began again. "We all saw people we loved. What did _you_ see?"

Jack's face closed off at once, like always when someone was stupid enough to ask him about what it felt being dead or something equally idiotic. A casual observer wouldn't have realized that his mental shields had slammed down, but Ianto knew him better (and more intimately) than anyone else in the team.

Better than even Jack himself would have imagined, in truth.

"Nothing," Jack finally said flatly, with a shake of his head. "There was nothing."

"Jack," Gwen, of course, couldn't leave it alone, despite of the finality in Jack's voice. "What would have tempted _you_? What visions would have convinced you to open the Rift?"

Again, Jack held back with an answer for a while. Ianto wished he would say _nothing_ again, but he knew better than that. Every man had his breaking point. Even Jack Harkness.

"The right kind of Doctor," Jack replied in the end; he got up and headed out of the office, leaving a dumbfounded and mildly insulted Gwen, who had no clue what that answer could have meant, behind.

"Jack ...?" she tried again, uncertainly, but Jack didn't even look back.

Ianto's heart broke into a million pieces. Again.

Because, unlike Gwen, he knew exactly what that statement, coming from Jack, truly meant.

* * *

Jack walked out of the office into the main Hub area, his shoulders stiff with tension.

"Where are they with those coffees?" he muttered angrily.

Somewhere close by, a machine beeped. A machine wired up to that hand in the tank. The Doctor's hand, although Ianto doubted that anyone else, with the possible exception of Tosh, would be aware of that.

_He_ knew, of course. The hand had been kept in the Secure Archives of Torchwood One, after all, from the Sycorax invasion up to the destruction of the Tower, in a special safe, created for the sole purpose of holding it. He'd seen it several times, doing inventory, and knew what it was. He'd wondered ever since how Jack had managed to lay hand on it. The locks must have malfunctioned, due to the extensive destruction of Torchwood Tower's systems.

Jack suddenly held on and looked at the tank, in which the hand was now pulsing. He ran down the stairwell with the elegance of a festival dancer and stopped in front of the tank to check on it. He stared at the hand… and slowly began to smile.

At that very moment, an unnatural wind began to blow in the Hub, coming from somewhere above, ruffling his hair. Seconds later, Ianto heard it – that peculiar grinding, groaning noise he had heard many times from tape recording during his training year at Torchwood One.

It was the noise of the TARDIS, landing right before their doorstep – or right above their heads, depending on one's location within the base. And then a rather unremarkable blue police box from the 1960s materialized on the Plass, parking right atop the invisible lift.

Ianto turned his attention from the external cameras back to the Hub, but Jack was no-where to see. The hand in the tank was gone, too… but Ianto had an educated guess where they might have gone. The Doctor was here – how could Jack have resisted the chance of meeting him again?

Following a sudden inspiration, Ianto left the tourist office and stepped out onto the Plass. He might not be able to confiscate the TARDIS at first sight, as Torchwood regulations still would demand, but he wanted at least to take a good look at it. Perhaps take some photos, too, for later, when the Doctor had left again, should Jack develop a sudden burst of nostalgia or homesickness after the TARDIS. Or Tosh, for that matter.

Jack, however, overtook him mid-way, running towards the blue box as if chased by dogs, with a big smile on his face. As if he had been running towards his future. As if he only had to reach out to get anything he had ever wanted. As if he had been heading for _home_.

He had obviously been prepared to leave any time, as he was carrying a fairly large backpack, too. That little detail made it very clear that he had been waiting for this moment for a very long time.

He had never wanted to stay with them. He had just been bidding his time, until the Doctor would arrive.

Ianto had never thought it could hurt so much. He'd have understood if Jack had left in anger and disappointment, at a whim of his heart, catching a glimpse of the TARDIS as his best means of getting off this pathetic little backwater planet. They _had_ betrayed and killed him, after all. Repeatedly.

Ianto himself had used him and the Torchwood he had built after his own vision, hiding a half-converted Cyberwoman in his very basement, using the attraction between them and playing hard to get, just to keep Jack's interest otherwise occupied. They might have moved on to a higher, more honest level, even became intimate in the backlash of the Suzie disaster, but that did not change the fact that Ianto had got his foot in the door through lies and deceit. Even if Tosh had helped him a bit, without his knowledge.

The others, too, all had their bigger or smaller lies, even sweet, loyal Toshiko. They were only human, after all. Still, they had all been together in the most recent, worst betrayal that had killed Jack twice and almost destroyed the entire planet. So yeah, Ianto could have understood if Jack had left in anger and disillusion.

But that was clearly _not_ the case. Jack was leaving in _joy_, carrying a backpack that must have been kept, hidden and ready, under his desk for a _very_ long time. His face was shining with hope and happiness – emotions Ianto had never seen on him in all the time he had been working for Torchwood Three, not in such pure, undulated form – like that of a small child on a birthday party.

"Doctor!" he cried out, running across the Plass, blind and deaf for anything – or anyone – else than the blue police box, parking right above the invisible lift. The TARDIS' engines started grinding again; the unnatural wind came up anew, Jack's greatcoat flapped like the sail of some ancient sailing ship in a violent storm. He was almost there.

Ianto turned around and walked back to the tourist office. He didn't want to see Jack entering the TARDIS, deliriously happy to see the Doctor again, leaving them behind without a second thought. Or without a first one, for that matter.

And so, having turned his back to the events, he couldn't see the TARDIS fading away, right before Jack could have touched it – _or_ Jack throwing himself into that emptiness in despair and vanishing from sight.

~TBC~


	2. Chapter 2: Confrontations

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Author's notes:** for disclaimer, rating, etc. see Chapter 1

I have no idea how the arrival of the TARDIS _above_ on the Plass could cause such a mess _below_, in the Hub, but it's canon, so I used it. *g*

My version of the events at Canary Wharf that Tosh and Ianto are refrerring to can be read in "Eye Witness", which is also available on this site.

* * *

**Chapter 02 – Confrontations**

When Ianto entered the working area of the Hub, he found it in a disarray. Loose papers, blown off the various desks by the arrival of the TARDIS, lay scattered all over the floor; some of them were floating in the water at the foot of the water tower. He went over there like an automaton and picked them up absent-mindedly. They might be needed later, and who would have to redo them if they got destroyed? He himself, as usual.

The alarms sounded and the cog door rolled to the side, letting in Tosh and Owen, returning from their coffee run. Gwen, hearing the alarms, walked out of Jack's office and down the stairs to meet them.

"Have you seen Jack on your way in?" she asked petulantly, not used to Jack walking out on her and leaving her behind.

Tosh shook her head. "No. I thought _you_ were with him," and she shot Ianto a questioning look. Ianto shook his head very discretely and gave her their secret hand sing of _later_.

Owen looked around. "And _I thought_ Teaboy's already cleaned up here," he said nastily. "What's the matter?"

"Umm…" Gwen, too, looked around cluelessly. "He was just here," she noticed the absence of the hand in the tank for the first time and became so deathly pale that her freckles seemed to burn in her face. "The hand… the hand's gone… Something's taken it. _And_ Jack! He's gone."

"I don't think so," Ianto said, his voice incredibly soft but with an edge to it that drew the others' attention to him at once. "In fact, I'm quite sure that he went willingly."

"He wouldn't just leave us!" Gwen protested; somehow Ianto couldn't quite shake off the feeling that she'd actually wanted to say _he'd never just leave __me_, and felt a great amount of evil satisfaction contradicting her.

"You can check the CCTV footage is you don't believe me."

Tosh was already at it. She rewound the footage, and they could all watch Jack on the screen, running away from them, with a big, happy smile upon his face, without as much as a fleeting backward glance in the direction of the Hub.

"Look, Gwen!" Ianto demanded harshly, driven by the irresistible urge to hurt her feelings, just as she had so often and so thoughtlessly hurt _his_. "Look at his face! Does he look like a man who's being abducted?"

"But why?" she whispered, her eyes widening to impossible proportions, as always when she became over-emotional about something. "Why would he leave?"

Unfortunately for her, the wide-eyed routine didn't work on Ianto. Neither did the trembling chin routine. He simply shrugged and turned away from her, to Tosh, who looked every bit as shaken and dejected as he felt. He took her hand and squeezed it encouragingly, signalling her that she wasn't alone.

"Apparently, he saw no reason to stay," Tosh said after a lengthy pause, in a soft and hurt voice. "I can't really blame him… after what we've done, why would he want to stay?"

"I guess not even Teaboy's arse was a good enough reason, eh?" Owen snarled.

Ianto knew the doctor was just lashing out in his pain and anger, but he wasn't going to take Owen's shit anymore.

"At least I wasn't the one who shot him in he head," he replied coldly. "Even though _I knew_ that he'd come back."

The calculated cruelty of his answer stunned Owen for a moment. Then he jumped at Ianto in outrage, happy to have found an outlet for his pent-up frustration. Ianto elegantly sidestepped the attack; then he grabbed Owen's injured shoulder and gave it a merciless squeeze. Owen howled in pain and rolled up into a tight ball of misery on the ground.

Gwen squawked in protest, but Ianto stopped her with a raised hand.

"Hold your shit, Gwen! I'm not taking it any longer. I've put up with a lot from the two of you because I owed it to Jack, but not anymore. So get it into that thick skull of yours: this was the moment Jack had waited for all the time. He never _wanted_ to work for Torchwood; had you not been too lazy and too ignorant to look into the old records, you could have figured it out long ago, too. He'd been _drafted_; it was that or the cells. He only stayed here to sit out the time of waiting."

"But what was he waiting for?" Gwen asked tearily.

"For the right kind of Doctor," Ianto replied slowly, giving her a meaningful look, making her understand that he'd witnessed their domestic little scene in the office.

For once, Gwen actually had the decency to look uncomfortable.

"The Doctor?" Tosh repeated, understanding dawning in her eyes. "Jack has left with the _Doctor_?"

Only she and Ianto had ever been privy to the knowledge that Jack had once been the travelling companion of the Doctor – the same time-travelling alien Torchwood had specifically been created to capture. Tosh because she, too, had travelled with the Time Lord for two years, _before_ Jack would have met him in his personal timeline. Ianto because he had once been – and deep within still _was_ – an Archivist of Torchwood One, and it had been his job to know everything about Torchwood's Number One enemy.

Even if declaring him an enemy might have been a slight exaggeration on Her Majesty The Queen Victoria's side. Granted he _was_ an alien, and he could be a menace at times, but that didn't make him an _alien menace_ per definition. Even though Ianto would never forgive him his marked indifference at Canary Wharf. That he had not even tried to help all those people who'd been half-transformed or controlled by those earpods.

"Well, I haven't actually seen the _man_ he left with," he answered to Tosh's question, "but that old blue police box parking right on top of the invisible lift was a dead give-away. That and the sound of the TARDIS' engines."

"You recognized them from the old records?" Tosh smiled in understanding.

Ianto shook his head. "No; I recognized it from memory. I was at Canary Wharf, remember? And so was the Doctor," he added, his face hardening with the memory.

Tosh, who had also been present – accidentally – sighed. She had _not_ been happy with the Doctor's behaviour during that crisis; and she was still missing _her_ Doctor, the previous incarnation of the Time Lord. But she was more willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, if for no other reason, then for old times' sake.

Ianto, on the other hand, had no such old times to remember.

"Do you think he's ever coming back?" Owen asked, pale and still shaking with pain and shock.

"No," Ianto replied slowly. "No, I don't think so. He's finally reached his goal. He's found his Doctor. After having waited for him for a century and a half, he finally found him. He won't give up _that_, just to chase Weevils with us."

Gwen, having re-played the footage for what must have been the sixth time or so, sank into a chair and was sobbing uncontrollably.

"What are we gonna do now?" Owen muttered.

"What we always do: our jobs," Ianto replied with a shrug.

"Without Jack?" Gwen demanded incredulously.

Ianto gave her an unfriendly look. "I don't know about you, but _my_ work for Torchwood didn't start with Jack Harkness. It doesn't end with him, either. Jack's gone, that's what he wanted, so accept it, 'cos it ain't gonna change. But _we_ still have a job to do, and we _must_ do it. More so than before, now that Jack no longer is there."

"But _how_ are we supposed to do it?" Tosh asked.

"We'll continue the same way we've worked so far," Ianto replied with a shrug. "See how things work out. I don't think we should make Jack's disappearance public just yet."

"Why not?" Gwen asked with a surprised frown. "We'll need a new leader, and _somebody _ought to be promoted."

"_If_ certain agencies learned that the last functional Torchwood branch has lost its leader, they'll try to move on into our territory," Ianto explained grimly. "Torchwood has gained an undeservedly bad reputation after Canary Wharf; only Jack's personal connections saved _this_ outpost from being closed. Certain factions from UNIT wanted very much to take over watching the Rift."

"And how could _you_ know that?" Owen muttered nastily. "Through pillow talk after shagging the boss?"

"I'm the Archivist," Ianto replied, with barely suppressed anger in his eyes. "It's my job to know such things. And, unlike certain people here, I take my job very seriously."

"Ianto, wait!" Tosh interrupted, before the fight between the two men could have deteriorated into something _really_ ugly. "Let's say we're trying to go on as before. That would mean that we'll need to do Jack's job aside of our own. How do you expect us to do that? You and I are already overworked as it is, and Jack was dubbing for Suzie, since he never hired anyone in her stead."

"He hired _me_!" Gwen protested.

Tosh gave her a scathing look. "And you are a weapons expert since when? You couldn't even fire a gun before you came to Torchwood; and you aren't particularly good with alien tech, either. So, how exactly _are_ you replacing Suzie?"

"_You_ are the tech expert," Gwen shrugged. "I'm the police liaison."

"Yeah, and you've done such a great job of it that none of the coppers would be willing to even speak to us anymore," Owen muttered darkly.

Ianto didn't find it necessary to inform their doctor that the Cardiff police still _did_ speak to Torchwood… if _he_ was the one who did the asking. That was nobody's business.

"We can only manage if we stick together," he said placatingly. "I'm willing to take on Jack's administrative duties, unless someone else wants them…" he looked around questioningly, but there were obviously no takers.

"We're field agents," Owen commented. "You're the admin…"

"… and the only one who knows how to do them properly anyway," Tosh added, loyal soul that she was. "But Ianto, you're already doing the work of three people at the very least, how are you planning to do even more?"

"We'll have to organize things better," Ianto said. "I'm not going to clean up after you lot any longer; you're grown-ups, and grown-ups should be capable of putting their pizza boxes into the trash bin or washing their coffee mugs alone. We can take turns at doing the food runs and feeding the Weevils… _or_ cleaning out the cells. I'll keep taking care of Myfanwy, as she's likely to attack anyone else, but I won't be your zookeeper if I have to stand in for Jack when dealing with other organizations."

"Hey!" Owen protested. "Who's made you our boss, all of the sudden? Since when do you get to assign additional work to us?"

"I'm the head of administration," Ianto replied calmly. "It's my job to keep things organized. If you're not happy with the way I'm doing it, you're welcome to take over all the paperwork – _including_ your own that I most certainly won't be doing for you in the future. The same for you, Gwen," he glanced at the pouting woman. "As a copper, you _must_ have been taught how to write a proper report, so do it. You haven't done much actual work here since Jack hired you. Try to be a bit more useful for now."

"You have no right to order me around!" Gwen scowled. "Owen is the one with the longest service record here, even if I was hired in Suzie's stead."

"Actually, it's Tosh," Owen corrected. "She was hired before me."

"I don't want the admin job," Tosh murmured. "I suck at paperwork. And as the only tech left, I've got enough to do already, even without dubbing for Suzie as well, which I'll have to do, now that Jack's gone."

"Besides, Tosh isn't the one with the longest service record here," Ianto added flatly.

Owen looked at him, bewildered. "Sure she is; she was recruited in late 2003. I was recruited in early 2005. That gives her more than a year of seniority on me."

"Not on _me_, though," Ianto said. "I've been recruited by Torchwood London out of my first year at university, in February 2003. _I am_ the longest-serving Torchwood member here."

"Yeah, but you weren't Torchwood Three," Gwen said.

"No," Ianto agreed. "I was with Headquarters, which means I automatically outrank you all – not that it would really matter, since what we'll have to do is trying to keep Jack's absence secret, for the time being anyway."

"I'm still not sure we can do it," Owen said. "Or can you convincingly fake Jack's signature?"

"Of course I can," Ianto replied with a shrug. "I'd never have managed to get things done in time otherwise, lazy as he was with doing his paperwork."

"So that's what we're gonna do?" Gwen demanded. "Cheating and lying, just to cover for Jack, who's run away from his duty? From _us?"_

Again, it suspiciously sounded as if she'd wanted to say _from me_ instead, but no-one really cared.

"We'll _obfuscate_," Ianto answered with emphasis, "in the unlikely case that Jack might come back, after all. If he doesn't, not in the next six months, we'll have to work out a different strategy. Right now, though, we _must_ pretend that he's still here somewhere… just extremely busy. Otherwise the Crown might find it necessary to close us, as Torchwood London was closed, and hand over everything to UNIT – which is not something we would want, right?"

Tosh and Owen nodded in complete agreement. Gwen, though, looked even more confused than before.

"Oh, I'm sorry, sorry," she said nervously, "I get a bit confused. Which one's UNIT? All these abbreviations make my head spin."

Owen rolled his eyes, "You _never_ read any of the boody memos, do you? You should give them a try, you know; it might make you look a mite less retarded."

"UNIT is the acceptable face of intelligence gathering on aliens," Ianto intervened in his best Archivist mode before the fight between the two could have escalated. "The abbreviation stands for Unified Intelligence Taskforce. It's a military organization, operating under the auspices of the United Nations, and its purpose is to investigate and combat paranormal and extraterrestrial threats to the Earth."

At this point, Gwen's eyes bulged a little and became slightly glassy, but Ianto continued mercilessly.

"Until the late 1970s, Brigadier Alistair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart was in charge of the British contingent of UNIT, which is under the purview of the British government's Department C19."

"Which was actually the best era of UNIT," Owen commented. "The old man was remarkably level-headed when it came to dealing with alien invasions, if one can trust the old reports. This new batch of UNIT brasses tends to be a little heavy-handed; not to mention complete assholes."

"Since then, a number of different staff officers followed him in that position," Ianto said in a pedantic tone, "but he's still called back from his retirement whenever a countrywide crisis arises. Fortunately, he's been a supporter of Jack's for quite a few years, but not even his influence might be enough if UNIT figures out that we're on our own."

The explanations seemed to confuse Gwen even more.

"I don't understand," she complained. "If we're on the same side, why can't UNIT know that Jack's gone? Why would they want to take over our base? They don't have jurisdiction here… do they?"

"In theory?" Owen asked. "No, they don't. But once they have moved in with all their red-capped soldiers and big guns, we wouldn't have a rat's chance to get rid of them again."

"There's always been competition between the two organizations," Ianto explained patiently. "They only left us alone so far because Jack was favoured by the Brigadier, even against Yvonne Hartman. But they would not tolerate a small group of civilians, some of whom didn't even have proper training," his side glance at Gwen made it clear which one of them he meant, "in charge of what's probably the most dangerous place in Great Britain. And without Headquarters to weigh in backing up our claim we'd find ourselves fired and Retconned in no time."

"Or worse," Tosh added quietly. "They're ruthless, Gwen, They might have a similar agenda, but you wouldn't want to be at their mercy. "I know _I wouldn't_."

"Neither would I," Ianto agreed. "So, it will be the best for us all if we kept up appearances and continued as before. Who knows, Jack may even have a change of heart eventually and come back."

"You don't really believe _that_, though, do you?" Tosh asked quietly.

"No," Ianto admitted, "but I don't want to rule out the possibility, either. Miracles happen."

In the next moment, the Rift alarm went off, and the three field agents (plus one head admin) had to run out to deal with multiple Weevil sightings.

* * *

Dealing with whatever the still hiccupping Rift spat out took them the rest of the day. They had to collect four Weevils from three different locations – fortunately, they were just frightened strays that let themselves usher back to the sewers without much reluctance. However, two of them were not yet equipped with tracking chips, so that, too, had to be done. Which meant that Owen had to run back to the Hub for the chipping equipment, while Ianto tried to keep the frightened creatures under control, armed with a stun gun and a can of Weevil spray only.

To the amazement of a mildly shocked PC Andy (he was the one who had called them in the first place) he managed _not_ to get eaten or maimed during that time.

Then they had to pick up a small colony of what Jack called _those spidery mice things_ that had somehow found their way into a school library and nearly scared the elderly librarian lady to death. Tosh couldn't understand why. Granted, they _did_ look like six-inch spiders with silver fur and a long tail, but they were actually rather cute, with those twitchy, mouse-like little ears and the four pairs of gleaming dark eyes.

Gwen, for her part, completely agreed with the librarian lady. She found the creatures creepy and felt herself justified in her dislike when she learned from Tosh that Jack hated the things, too. There was a total of eight of them, and they were disturbingly friendly… clingy even. They seemed to particularly like Ianto and his suit.

It was past midnight when they finally returned to the Hub, shutting the one Weevil that had refused to cooperate away in a cell and the spidery mice in a terrarium in Jack's office. Temporarily. Ianto was planning to move them to some kind of alien zoo later that was better suited to take in small, harmless alien creatures.

Gwen was the first one to leave; but not for home as all the others had assumed. Instead, she waited until even Ianto had left, sometime around 3 am, and sneaked back into the Hub, heading directly to Jack's office.

She knew there had to be a medium-sized book somewhere. A book containing all important phone numbers, from the official places Jack had to deal with on a regular basis. Starting with the hotline to the Prime Minister's office.

She _needed_ those lists. Ianto was clearly planning a _coup d'état_ to take over Torchwood, that sneaky little traitor! And Tosh and Owen would just let him! Well, Gwen Cooper was _not_ going to roll over for him! She had been hired in Suzie's place; not to become some dull-minded tech, but to be Jack's second-in-command, the one to step in and take charge when Jack was hindered.

In times like now.

Tosh and Owen weren't any real competition for her. They were specialists, after all; they needed to do their actual jobs. And besides, they didn't have any people-oriented skills. Owen perhaps might have had some, back when he used to be a real doctor, but there clearly wasn't much left of _that_. He'd realize that it would be much better for the team if Gwen dealt with the local authorities _and_ the police, respectively. From there on, getting assigned as the new leader of Torchwood Cardiff would only be a logical step.

But Ianto! Ianto was sneaky and apparently a lot more ambitious than she'd have given him credit for. Plus, he clearly had connections, so she had to be very careful when dealing with him, at least until she had gained enough support from higher places.

She wished she could Retcon him back to kindergarten and be done with the problem, but considering that _Ianto_ was the one who kept the amnesia pills in safe storage, that was not an option. She'd been lucky that she had been able to pilfer the few left on Jack's desk a couple of weeks ago, when he'd made Rhys forget about her infidelity.

So, as she could not get rid of Ianto on her own, she needed connections, too. Perhaps at the highest places that were aware of the existence of Torchwood, to work against his influence. Someone from UNIT, perhaps; they apparently had a lot of power. Or the head of the City Council. Or an aide from the Prime Minister's office.

She sneaked into Jack's office – and almost got a heart attack from the multiple chirping sounds that greeted her. Those spidery mice… _things_ gathered at the nearest glass wall of their terrarium, watched her from those very bright, multi-faceted eyes, and chirped away excitedly. Gwen shuddered; she could understand why Jack hated them so much.

She searched Jack's desk hurriedly and was relieved when she found the phone book in one of the drawers. Getting out her mobile phone, she started taking photos, from each page where any numbers were marked.

~TBC~


	3. Chapter 3: Proposals

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Author's notes:** for disclaimer, rating, etc. see Chapter 1

The dialogue between Rhys and his father is from the 2nd season Torchwood episode "Something Borrowed", of course, while Gwen's comment about nobody else wanting to have her from "Kiss, Kiss, Bang, Bang" – although in a different context.

* * *

**Chapter 03 – Proposals**

When Rhys Williams learned about Captain Jack Harkness having gone missing, the first thing he felt was relief. Utter and overwhelming relief. Now that Gwen's irritating, demanding and flirtatious boss had vanished off the face of Earth without a trace, he could finally hope that the wedding Gwen had put off repeatedly would take place, after all.

Energized by that hope, he ran off to buy the engagement ring at once. It was a very pretty piece: gold, with a perfect, small diamond, and it cost him quite a batch of money. But now that he'd finally gotten that job he'd been working for so diligently for years – manager at _Harwood's_ – he could afford such indulgences.

His parents weren't exactly overjoyed about it… to phrase it carefully. They'd never liked Gwen, and they liked Gwen's _parents_ even less. Especially her mother who, Rhys would be the first to admit freely, _was_ a poisonous snake of extraordinary proportions and held her husband securely under her thumb. Said husband was, at least, a genuinely friendly bloke, and a rather smart one, too – save for the fact that he was completely fallen for his wife.

"It takes one to know one," muttered Barry Williams, still not entirely reconciled with the choice of his only son. "You should take a good, hard look at the mother before marrying the daughter, Rhys. That would give you a sobering glimpse into your own future."

Rhys, however, was not willing to listen to the voice of reason.

"Dad, leave it," he said angrily. "I'm marrying her! I love Gwen. Every atom of me loves Gwen, has done since the first time I laid eyes on her, okay? I never wanted anyone else."

"You loved Cerys Morgan once," his father pointed out.

Rhys rolled his eyes. "I was _twelve_ years old, Dad!"

"You had more common sense at the age of twelve than you have now," his father commented dryly. "But it's your life, son. I can't hinder you in ruining it."

"You're right; you can't!" Rhys returned, storming off in righteous anger.

* * *

And so it came that on that very evening Rhys Williams went down on one knee in front of his beloved Gwen and asked her to marry him. The romantic gesture was somewhat ruined by the fact that he promptly got a twinge in his back and had to lie on the couch for the rest of the evening, of course. But Gwen said yes nonetheless.

"Well, no-one else would have me," she explained her best friends, Carrie and Trina, two days later in their favourite pub.

She'd known the girls from her time _before_ the police. They'd worked together in a shop – and hated it. Since then, Carrie had married a civil servant from the City Hall, and Trina had been engaged to the middle-aged manager of _St. David's Hotel_ for nearly five months by now. So Gwen really had to do _something_ if se didn't want to lose her last chance to catch up with them.

Besides, being a married woman did have its advantages.

"What about that boss of yours you've been fawning over for the last year or so, though?" Trina asked in surprise. "I thought you were on the best way to catch him," her eyes turned dreamy. "I can't blame you, really. I only saw him once, but… he's _gorgeous_! Like a film star!"

"He's also, unfortunately, quite gay," Carrie commented. The other two stared at her in surprise, and she shrugged. "Well, Huw" – that was her husband – "saw him flirting like crazy with Mr. Grainger's PA – and everyone in the City Hall knows that Idris Hopper is the gayest person in town."

"Jack's _not_ gay!" Gwen protested. "Sure, he'd shag everything on two legs, but he isn't gay! He just… he doesn't have the same moral restrictions as most people. He's the biggest man-slut on this planet."

"So that's why you chose Rhys instead him?" Trina asked.

"No," Gwen replied teary-eyed. "I chose Rhys cos Rhys has always been there for me. Through all this madness that's my life now, even when I haven't even deserved it. I need someone I can trust. Someone I can count on, no matter what."

"Does it mean your boss is not reliable?" Trina pressed on.

"He's left us, that bastard!" Gwen blurted out. "He's left without a word, and we have no idea where he's gone and when he'll be back… if ever."

"Oh, dear!" Carrie gasped. "Who's running the show at your company now? I mean, you're Special Ops or whatever, you can't just quit or whatnot!"

"Right now?" Gwen sighed. "I'm trying to do my best. Unofficially, of course. We cannot admit just yet that he's gone. It's… complicated. But if he doesn't come back in the next six weeks, I'll apply the request to be made the official team leader."

"You can actually do _that_?" Trina was duly impressed.

"Well, I've been hired instead of Jack's second-in-command, right after she'd died more than a year ago," Gwen replied with a shrug. "It would be only proper if I got appointed as the new leader of our team. But it would be a mistake to act right away; Jack could still come back, and even if he doesn't, I'll have to show the others that I can run things on my own just fine."

Holding her head high, she swayed over to the bar to fetch the next round of drinks, it being her turn now. Carrie and Trina exchanged meaningful looks.

"Poor Gwen," Carrie said with the false sympathy of a married woman towards a less fortunate friend who still had to find her way to the haven of wedded bliss. "And she was _so_ sure she'd get her boss around, eventually."

"I wonder," Trina's eyes got that speculative look as always when she was about to say something _really_ mean. "If he was really such a big slut, how comes that Gwen never managed to get in his pants? Unless you're right and he _is_ gay, of course."

"It certainly wasn't for the lack of trying," Carrie agreed. "But apparently, even the biggest sluts have their standards."

The two giggled a little over Gwen's delusions. They might have been best friends with her, but Gwen had always held herself for something better. It was, well, _satisfying_ that she'd have to put up with Rhys, after all, instead of that gorgeous boss of hers.

Not that there was anything wrong with Rhys, they agreed. He was a nice bloke, with a good job, and he worshipped the ground Gwen walked on. Hell, he even did all the housework and could cook like a pro! Only Gwen couldn't quite value what she had in him, always dreaming for somebody more spectacular – like her boss.

Now she'd clearly decided to go for the sure thing she had; the only question was if it would be enough for her in the long way.

Somehow both Carrie and Trina had their doubts about that.

"By the way," Trina said slowly, "don't you think that Mr. Grainger might be interested in what's going on with Torchwood? He's head of the City Council, after all, and responsible for the safety of Cardiff. If something is wrong with Torchwood…"

Carrie gave her an uncomfortable look. "You want me to go behind Gwen's back?"

"I don't _want_ it," Tina clarified. "She's my friend, too. But if any Special Ops troops are running wild, without a proper leader, Mr. Grainger ought to know it."

"You think he could do anything about it?" Carrie asked doubtfully. "I mean, they're Special Ops, or something like that; they don't answer to the City Council or whatever. 'Outside the government, beyond the police'… aint that what Gwen always tells us?"

"And her word is all you have for it," Trina reminded her. "She can be wrong; but even if she's right, Mr. Grainger might know what question to ask – and _whom_ to ask."

"True," Carrie lowered her voice, seeing that Gwen was heading back with their drinks. "Tell you what: I'll speak with Huw about it; let him decide what to do. He's a civil servant; it's his job to deal with shit like this."

"That may be the best," Trina agreed; and then they could no longer talk about the problem, because Gwen was back, handing them the drinks.

* * *

Thirty-six hours after the girls' bar night Idris Hopper, personal assistant to Council Leader Patrick Grainger, was having a serious conflict of interests.

On the one hand, he was deeply in Mr. Grainger's depth – the only one from the city leaders who was willing to keep him, despite the fact that he'd been the secretary of the ill-remembered Margaret Blaine. The very woman who'd nearly blown up the whole city and half of South Wales with her poorly planned nuclear plant and subsequently vanished without a trace.

Never mind that Idris hadn't had the faintest idea about, nor any part in Mayor Blaine's megalomaniac plans. He was still there, and thus he'd offered a convenient target for Blaine's opposition. Even though there was very little anybody could have done afterwards.

Mr Grainger had been the only one who'd believed in Idris' innocence and even gone as far as assigning him as his own personal assistant. As he'd pointed out, Mrs Grainger considered an openly gay man a lot less of a threat than some pretty young girl with ambitions to become the next Mrs Grainger.

On the other hand, Ianto Jones from Torchwood was an old friend of his, and he didn't want the younger man to get in trouble.

"I really don't know what to do," he confessed to Claire Lyndon, his only personal friend among the City Hall staff. "Mr Grainger needed to know about the Torchwood leader vanishing, there's no question about that. But if they wanted to keep it confidential, at least for the time being, they must have had a reason; a good one. And if Mr Grainger starts asking questions in the wrong places – or in the _right_ places, for that matter – they could get in serious trouble."

"Hmmm," Claire thought about the problem while sipping on her coffee.

She was a woman of beauty, elegance and refined tastes, but she had even more inside that pretty head of hers than most would have expected. How she could have married David Lyndon, the single most boring and least attractive man in Cardiff, was beyond Idris' understanding. She was so _smart_ in everything _else_ – how could she have made such a poor choice?

There was definitely a great deal of truth in the saying that love was blind.

"Are you really sure that these Torchwood blokes aren't up to something sinister?" she finally asked.

Idris nodded without hesitation. "Yes, I'm very sure. Torchwood has been here since the nineteenth century; I've checked in the archives. They only ever answered to the Crown, but never did anything that would have endangered the city's population. Obviously, we're not that sure _what_ they're doing, but they're supposed to be the good guys."

"If you say so," Claire didn't seem completely persuaded.

"Besides, I've known Ianto Jones since primary school," Idris continued. "He's never been anything but a decent bloke. I don't think he'd be involved in anything illegal."

"Perhaps not _illegal_," Claire allowed, "but definitely dangerous."

Idris shrugged. "That's their job, as I understand. But I don't want any of their operations endangered, just because Huw's brainless little wife heard something from an equally brainless friend of hers."

"And where did this friend of hers hear anything about Torchwood's secrets?" Claire asked with a frown.

Idris shrugged again. "Apparently, she's Torchwood, too."

"And she talks about confidential stuff with her friends?" Claire was clearly _not_ impressed, and how could one blame her? As the secretary of the Mayor she knew well enough what _confidential_ meant. Had _she _done something stupid like that, she could have kissed her job good-bye on the spot.

"It seems so, yeah," Idris replied, wondering how Torchwood dealt with confidentiality if _this_ was any indication.

"Then she's a liability, and you need to warn this Jones character," Claire said. "Who knows what other trouble she might cause?"

Idris thought about that for a moment, and then he nodded decisively. If Huw's brainless wife was any indication, that friend of hers at Torchwood must have been a menace.

"You're right," he said. "That's what I'm gonna do."

* * *

Despite his relative youth, Ianto had a tightly organized mind. He had to; otherwise his photographic memory would long have driven him mad. He'd had to learn early on to select all the billion things he remembered, order them by importance and put them away for further use.

Or to ignore them safely for the rest of his life, no matter how long – or how _short_, considering that he was working for Torchwood – _that_ might be.

As a result, the rest of his life was tightly organized, too. He freely admitted being a tad too pedantic and entirely anal-retentive, but he never failed to add that there were worse habits. _Far_ worse ones.

Besides, others benefited from the order kept by him, too, didn't they?

Lisa had been the first – and so far only – person who'd ever managed to break him out of his self-inflicted cage of perfect order and continuous readiness to face whatever life might throw at him. With her, he'd been able to relax and forget his petty concerns – as far as he was capable of forgetting.

At least he could _ignore_ things with her and feel like other young men his age. For the first – and so far last – time in his life, he'd known happiness.

Losing Lisa, and that twice, the second time so much worse than the first, had broken something in him. Something that could never be fixed again.

Oh, he _had_ put himself together during his suspension. Had even, surprisingly enough, developed a tentative friendship with Jack. But the walls of his self-built cage had gone up again, and it didn't seem as if they would lower themselves any time soon.

Or ever again.

Becoming intimate with Jack had not changed things. On the contrary. Most of the time, Jack was chaos personified, a force of nature, and if he didn't want to lose himself completely, Ianto had to hold onto the hypothetical bars of his cage.

In that cage, in that order, there was stability that could help him standing in the whirlwind that was Jack Harkness.

There _had_ been quiet moments of closeness, in which they could have connected on a different level. That unfortunate affair with the fairies… Ianto had been the only one who'd truly understood Jack. He'd seen him shattered by the cold shoulder his team had shown him, hurting deeply by Gwen's vicious accusations.

He'd held him, offering wordless support while Jack cried.

But those moments had been rare and far between, and they were too often interrupted by a Rift alarm, some unexpected disaster – or Gwen's constant demands for Jack's exclusive attention.

With that, he could never compete. Being loud-mouthed, demanding and aggressive was not his forte. It had never been, and after the loss of Lisa, he didn't even bother to try.

Nothing could have brought her back anyway.

The others didn't understand how he could have replaced Lisa with Jack so quickly. Not even sweet, loyal Toshiko, who'd loved them both dearly. Their minds didn't work along the same lines as his.

Lisa was lost, gone forever. There was nothing he could have done about _that_. So he'd stored his memories of her, the wonderful _and_ the horrible ones, in their proper place, where he could visit them whenever he wanted.

Torchwood One psychic training was very effective, even on the basic level mandatory for all employees. The Archivists, having been more important than anyone else, had trained with the best. So yes, Ianto could _choose_ the memories he wanted to revisit from time to time, even though he would never be able to forget any of them.

Unless he suffered serious brain damage, but in that case it wouldn't really count anymore, would it?

But he couldn't _live_ in his memories. So he'd stored them safely away and accepted what Jack was offering. Comfort sex was not the worst way to deal with emotional trauma, especially when offered by a true master.

It would have been hypocritical to deny that Jack knew how to give a guy a good time. He might have been interested in Ianto's body, mostly – as Owen had rubbed it in Ianto's face so often – but his interest had been… _intense_. And creative. Bordering on avant-garde. And Ianto freely admitted that he'd enjoyed Jack's ministrations. Who wouldn't have?

He even realized after a while that he was falling for Jack – which was a complication, but not one he couldn't have dealt with in the long run. Not for the highly enjoyable sex alone; in their rare moments of closeness, he'd discovered Jack's vulnerable side, a need that went much deeper than his overactive libido.

In the heart of his hearts, Jack liked to be taken care for, even to be pampered. It might have been a need born out of some terrible loss in his still nebulous past, or simply out of a harsh life he'd led earlier, but it was definitely there.

Ianto was willing to give him what he needed. What _Ianto_ needed was to be useful, to _be_ needed. On that – probably unhealthy – level of mutual dependence, they were a perfect match.

He'd never love Jack the way he'd loved Lisa. That part of him had died with her. But – thanks to his training in mental complementarization – he'd have been ready and willing to, not to mention capable of, developing a different kind of love… had Jack not left them.

But Jack _had_ left them, and as usual, it fell to Ianto to pick up the pieces. Owen was so guilt-ridden he could barely function anymore, and was almost constantly drunk. Tosh, also quite ravaged by guilt, tried to compensate by working twenty-four/seven and was overworked and on the verge of total exhaustion. She laboured in some sort of haze most of the time; the only way she could keep going.

And Gwen…

Ianto shuddered. Gwen's attempts to play boss in Jack's absence were becoming more of an annoyance with each passing day. That she didn't realize that her little nightly trip to Jack's office had been recorded by the internal security cameras was downright insulting. Did she think that they were, that _Ianto_ was an idiot?

Of course, she probably wasn't even aware of the existence of an internal security system. She was fairly ignorant towards anything outside her personal interests; and besides, she wasn't technically savvy. Perhaps she thought the general CCTV network was the only security system the base had. And since it was a known fact that there were no CCTV cameras in Jack's office, she probably thought herself safe.

Ianto had checked the object of her interest, of course, and had been mildly shocked to realize that she'd been after Jack's phone register. It was typical for Jack to let something confidential like that lie around freely in a desk drawer. He trusted his team, no matter how often they had disappointed him.

Plus, he hadn't known he'd have to leave so abruptly.

Or he simply hadn't cared, Ianto admitted to himself. They'd been but waystations on Jack's long journey back to the Doctor. And when the chance finally came, he ran off without looking back.

Ianto rubbed his burning eyes tiredly. He'd have to watch those numbers in Jack's phone register around the clock. Or rather have Tosh have Mainframe watch them. Whatever Gwen's plans with those phone numbers might be, they could easily lead to a major disaster. Impulsive as she was, and mostly preoccupied with her own wishes, she might not even realize that.

The ringing of his phone interrupted his thoughts. He reached for it automatically, only to realize a moment later that the ring tone was the wrong one. That surprised him greatly.

Part of his tightly organized life was that he had two phones. One for everything Torchwood-related, which was the one he'd used most during the last two years. The other one was for family and for the very few personal friends he still had. In theory anyway.

And _that_ tone was ringing now. Curious. Who'd call him this late in the night?

He fished the phone out of the inner pocket of his suit jacket and stared at the displayed number in confusion. It seemed unfamiliar, which meant that it was one he wasn't supposed to know. His memory worked with numbers particularly well. So, how could the caller know his personal number?

Well, there was only one way to find out. He shrugged and picked up the call. "Jones."

"Idris Hopper," a familiar voice answered. "Ianto, is that you? I wasn't sure your number was still the same."

"Yours certainly isn't," Ianto replied.

He hadn't seen Idris for years – not since he'd left for London – but he had a different phone number associated to him.

"I'm calling from the City Hall," Idris explained. "Moonlighting, as usual… I guess not an unknown thing to you, either."

"Not really," Ianto admitted.

"Anyway," Idris said, "we must talk. In private."

"About what?" Ianto really didn't have a clue what his old school friend might want from him, after all those years.

"Not now," Idris interrupted. "Listen, can you meet me in say, thirty minutes, at the _Old Sailor_? It's… quite urgent, actually."

"Urgent for whom?" Ianto asked. "Idris, are you in trouble?"

"No," Idris said slowly, "but I'm afraid _you_ might be; all of you."

Ianto was genuinely shocked by that. "That's… a bold statement," he said.

"I know," Idris sounded quite nervous. "Listen, I can't speak here. We really, really should meet in person."

Ianto closed his eyes for a moment. It was nearly midnight, and he'd been awake for almost thirty hours. He felt like death warmed over and wanted nothing but a hot shower and his bed.

On the other hand, if Idris saw it necessary to call him, out of the blue, after _years_, he perhaps should listen. Whatever other people might think of the young clerk, Idris Hopper was not a coward.

"All right," Ianto said tiredly. "I'll be there."

* * *

The _Old Sailor_ was a slightly seedy, traditional pub near the Mermaid Quay; one that the tourists would never find. One of the few that were open all night. It was for the locals, and Ianto found some strange comfort in that fact. The wood-panelled walls, the flashing slot machine at his back, the simply-clad men drinking their beer… all this had a reassuring touch of normalcy to it, something that he desperately needed right now.

He found Idris Hopper, wearing a suit that was well-fitted but definitely had been worn for too long, sitting at one of the corner tables, holding a lager with both hands. He looked as tired as Ianto felt, and seemed very uncomfortable with the situation – whatever it was.

Ianto got himself a beer, too, and plunged down on the stool opposite his old school friend rather heavily. Exhaustion could do that to a person.

"So, Idris," he said. "I'm here. "What's so important that you decided to hunt me down after how many years? Four? Five?"

"Closer to six, actually," Idris shrugged, "but who counts? Listen, Ianto, I could get in really big trouble over this, but I think you should know. Even if _I'm not_ supposed to…"

"Should know _what_?" Ianto asked patiently. Idris clearly hadn't outgrown the habit to babble when nervous.

"Sorry," Idris took a big gulp from his lager. "I'm really out of my depth here. Tell me; is it true that Captain Harkness is gone? That he left you without a word?"

Ianto stiffened in shock hearing that. What on Earth…

"You're right," he said after the necessary moment to collect himself again. "You're _not_ supposed to know that. Nobody outside of Torchwood is. So how comes that you _know_ about it?"

"Eavesdropping," Idris admitted, reddening in embarrassment. "Huw Cadman, one of the civil servants, came to see Mr Grainger today – well, yesterday by now – and told him. Apparently, his wife knows somebody from Torchwood, somebody she used to work with in some fashion boutique or whatnot, and they had a ladies' night in a bar, and then that other woman got drunk and whined about it to the others. Huw says his wife says that the chick was very upset because she had hopes concerning her boss, you see."

Ianto closed his eyes to keep himself from screaming. Gwen. Gwen-bloody-Cooper, getting them into deep shit again, out of sheer, selfish stupidity. Did the woman ever think of the possible consequences? They'd expressly agreed to keep Jack's disappearance confidential, and the stupid cow tells her lady friends in a _bar_?

"I'm gonna kill her," he muttered. "Slowly and very, very painfully."

"So, is it true?" Idris asked, his guileless blue eyes darkening in concern. "Is Captain Harkness gone?"

"Ianto nodded. "Yes. He left on a covert mission rather abruptly; not even _we_ know why and for how long. So we've decided to shut up about it until we learn more. Or, at least, I _thought_ we'd agreed," he added venomously.

"I imagined that something like that must have happened," Idris said. "I'm surprised, though, that somebody from your own organization would be so careless. You should do something about it before she causes any more harm."

"Do what?" Ianto asked bitterly. "I don't have the authorization to do _anything_. Jack's second-in-command has been killed a year or so ago, and he never appointed a new one. He tends to be a tad cavalier in his dealings with regulations, and that attitude has now come back and bitten us in the arse."

"Don't you have any higher authorities you could turn to?" Idris asked.

Ianto shook his head. He _wished_ One would still be there; he wouldn't hesitate to ask for instructions, even if Jack would skin him alive for it afterwards. Of course, if One were still there, _he_ wouldn't be in Cardiff to begin with. He'd be in London – married to Lisa, most likely.

He shook off such pointless thoughts and concentrated on explaining the situation to Idris without giving away anything his old school friend wouldn't know from the media anyway. Idris deserved some sort of answer – he had, after all, taken considerable risk to warn him. Perhaps having an ally inside the City Hall wouldn't be such a bad thing.

"Headquarters has been destroyed a couple of years ago; it was situated in Canary Wharf, you know, and…" he shrugged, letting Idris fill out the gaps as well as he could.

Idris, only familiar with the official version, nodded in understanding.

"The terrorist bombing, yeah, I heard about that. It was a horrible thing, they say," then he stopped abruptly and Ianto could almost see the wheels whirling in his head as he was trying to match data and events of the recent past. "Wait a minute, weren't you in London at that time?"

"Yep," if Ianto hoped that the monosyllabic answer would stop Idris, he was disappointed. Idris had always been clever and could never resist some good, old-fashioned detective work, based on pure deduction in Sherlock Holmes-style.

"You were working for the London branch, haven't you?" again, Ianto nodded. "Were you at Canary Wharf when it happened?"

Again, a brief nod, and Idris' face crumpled in compassion.

"It must have been terrible," he said. "I heard there were only twenty-some survivors, out of how many? Seven hundred? Seven hundred and fifty?"

"More than eight hundred, all together," Ianto replied tonelessly. "And even those who did get out wouldn't all make it. Some of us simply went mad. Others committed suicide. Right now, I only know about a dozen of us who're still functioning normally – well, as normally as one can after having seen what we saw."

"You keeping tab on the others?" Idris asked.

Ianto sighed. "Somebody has to; and as the only one still working for Torchwood, I'm in the best position to do that."

He didn't feel inclined to mention that Jack couldn't be care less whether the survivors of Canary Wharf – Yvonne's leftovers, as he called them – lived or died. Nonetheless, it was surprisingly liberating to discuss this with somebody who had no knowledge about the real facts and was simply sympathetic to their losses.

Idris had always been like that, even as a young boy. It was a shame that people hardly ever paid him back in the same coin. Ianto had to admit that he hadn't been such a shining exception from that rule, himself. And yet Idris had taken considerable risks to warn him, although they hadn't talked to each other for years.

"What I still don't understand," said Idris after a lengthy pause, "is why you would want to keep Captain Harkness' disappearance such a big secret. He does have the authority to come and go, doesn't he? According to the old city records, Torchwood's only ever answered to the Crown."

"True," Ianto said. "But we're supposed to send reports to UNIT _and_ to the Prime Minister's office, and as we can't guarantee that Jack would be back at any given time, other organizations might try to move in to our territory. UNIT, for example. Or MI5."

"And that would be such a bad thing?"

Idris knew, of course, what UNIT was – the red berets were very visible, even if their true purpose not disclosed to the population. Besides, he worked for the City Hall; more accurately, to Mr Grainger, who did deal with the commander of the local UNIT base on a semi-regular basis.

"It would be disastrous," Ianto paused, collecting his thoughts. "Look, I can't give you any details, but… We're a small team, with a very specific task that requires certain skills and a kind of special training no one else has. With Headquarters gone, we are the only still functioning branch; the only ones to know how to deal with the shit we're dealing with. No matter how efficient those other organizations are, they can't do it half as well as we do."

Which wasn't very good, but he was not about to tell Idris _that_.

"That wouldn't stop them trying to take over, though," Idris was getting the picture.

Ianto nodded. "And with Jack beyond our reach, there's no way to stop them, unless Her Majesty appoints a new leader for Torchwood."

"Shouldn't you contact the Crown, then?" Idris asked. "Perhaps a pre-emptive strike is exactly what you guys need to keep the situation under control."

"Perhaps," Ianto allowed. "But Jack might be back within reasonable time, and I don't want to rob him of the chance to set things straight again. He _is_ our boss, after all."

"But if he doesn't come back, soon, you'd lose your chance to protect your team," Idris warned him. "Vacancies in power always make people on the upper levels nervous. And nervous people tend to react harder than necessary."

"I know," Ianto sighed. "Which is why we decided to wait a few months. See if he returns. If not, I'll be forced to turn to the Crown. That was the plan anyway. Now, with Gwen having babbled, I'll have to think of something else."

"I thought you didn't have the authority," Idris said.

"I don't. But I know more about the internal politics than the others, having worked for Headquarters, so they listen to me."

"Save for that stupid git who babbled," Idris reminded him.

Ianto shrugged. "She never listens to anyone. Hell, she routinely ignored _Jack's_ orders most of the time."

"And Captain Harkness hasn't fired him? Why not?"

"That's a question I keep asking myself," Ianto admitted. "This Mr Grainger of yours – do you think he'll do something drastic with the information he's got?"

"I'm not sure," Idris said. "He's a good, decent man, who wouldn't willingly harm anyone. But if he thinks this new situation might endanger the city, he wouldn't hesitate to ask questions. In high places."

"Well, I can't blame the man for doing his job," Ianto sighed. "I'd probably do the same in his place. Thanks for warning me anyway. I owe you one."

"Remember that when I lose my job because of this," Idris replied, but he was smiling. "You don't happen to need a good PA at Torchwood, do you?"

"I'm afraid _that_ position is currently occupied," Ianto answered with a tried grin. "I say let's rather concentrate on _not_ getting you fired. Believe me, you're better off with your current job. Even if you have to work with idiots."

"Probably," Idris allowed reluctantly. "I'm just fed up with people treating me like shit, you know? Whatever Mayor Blaine did, it wasn't _my_ fault. And besides, your Captain Harkness and that weird bloke dealt with the problem."

"Jack dealt with Mayor Blaine?" Ianto asked in surprise. "I never heard about that."

"Yes, right, I forgot that you were still in London when we had that earthquake. Anyway, that bloke – big nose, big ears, piercing blue eyes, wearing a black leather jacket – just walked into my office with your boss and asked for the Mayor. Only that she didn't want to see them, so I had to stall them while she attempted to escape through her office window."

Ianto needed a moment to let _that_ mental image sink in. He might have been in London at the time of the earthquake, but he'd seen photos of the – probably late and entirely unlamented – Margaret Blaine. The idea of _that_ woman pressing herself through an office window – through _any_ window, in fact, save probably a floor-to-ceiling French window – was mind-boggling.

He mentally chastised himself for never having looked up the events connected to the Cardiff earthquake and the subsequent fall of Mayor Blaine. If Jack had been involved – and why would Idris lie about that? – it must have been more than just a political scandal about a shabbily constructed nuclear plant. Much more.

It was clearly something alien-related, but what? And who'd been the 'weird bloke' with the big ears?

He made a mental list of the people who could probably tell him more about the background of that particular crisis. The list turned out a depressingly short one: Jack was gone, Suzie was dead, Owen was fairly useless at the moment, and Gwen hadn't even been with Torchwood at that time – not that he'd ever ask Gwen for _reliable_ information anyway. Gossip, yes, but nothing that would really count.

Tosh, though, had already worked for Torchwood during the earthquake, hadn't she? And she might be willing to tell him, unless she'd been sworn to secrecy. Deciding to ask Tosh at the first suitable moment, Ianto rose from his stool.

"I'm beat," he declared. "If I go home right now, I might be able to catch three or four hours of sleep before I have to go back to work. Thanks for everything, Idris; and don't wait another six years before calling me again. We should meet more often. We used, to, once."

"The way goes in both directions," Idris replied. "But yeah, getting together from time to time would be nice. I don't have so many friends that I wouldn't find a niche for you in my social calendar."

His voice was bitter and dripping with sarcasm; that of a very lonely young man who'd grown used to be ignored and unappreciated, but not used enough to ignore the fact in turn. It made Ianto feel vaguely guilty. Surely, they'd drifted away since grammar school, especially after he'd gone to London, but he'd been back to Cardiff for over a year by now and never thought of seeking out Idris.

That had to change… and not for Idris' sake alone.

"When we've dealt with this problem, I'll call you," he promised; and he meant it.

Having friends of his own age, friends who'd known him pre-Torchwood, would be nice Having some kind of life outside Torchwood would be nice, too – although most likely not possible, unless you were Gwen Cooper who could get away with everything.

Still, he could sell his renewed friendship with Idris Hopper under the label of rebuilding lost contacts with the local authorities.

Idris nodded. "Yeah, it would do me no good to be seen with you right now. Not before you've dealt with your domestic crisis. But after that…"

"After that I'll call you," Ianto promised with a heartfelt yawn that nearly dislocated his jaw. "Sorry. I'm dead on my feet."

"Need a lift home?" Idris offered. "My car stands in the parking lot of the pub; and you really shouldn't be driving in this condition."

"You're probably right," Ianto admitted, swaying a little on his feet. "You sure you don't mind, though? You've got a long way, too."

"Quite sure," Idris rose, too, and buttoned his suit jacket. "It's nice to leave a pub in the company of a friend every one in a while."

And so they left together, strolling through the empty streets leisurely. At one point, Ianto swayed again, and Idris grabbed his arm to support him; it was a strangely comforting gesture, and he unconsciously leaned into it as they walked up to Idris' car.

Neither of them noticed the dark figure following them from doorway to doorway, filming them with an infrared camera.

~TBC~


	4. Chapter 4: Nightmares

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Summary:** Jack is gone, and the rest of the Torchwood Three team must see how they manage without him.

My thanks to weis07 for coming up with the idea of Rhys' nightmares.

* * *

**Chapter 04 – Nightmares**

Rhys Williams was dreaming. For a man who'd finally brought up the courage to ask for the hand of the love of his life – and even got a positive answer – it wasn't really surprising. A man on the threshold of wedded bliss was _supposed_ to have X-rated dreams of his upcoming wedding night, wasn't he?

Only that his dreams were not X-rated – unless there was such thing as X-rated nightmares, that is – neither had they anything to do with the planned wedding. They were nightmares all right; recurring ones.

He'd had them every night since the most recent earthquake, and they always came in the same order.

First, he was walking down endless corridors in some strange underground place. There were cells on both sides, with glass doors, and in the cells large-toothed monsters in jumpsuits, with faces like Halloween masks, howling in an eerie chorus.

Then, suddenly, he found himself in one of those cells, looking at Gwen through the glass. Gwen staring at him, teary-eyed, saying: _I'm sorry, Rhys, I truly am. I've cheated on you and drugged you, but it was all for your own good. I __had__ to shut you in, to keep you safe, can't you see it? Say that you forgive me! I need you to forgive me! Please!_

And then she was gone, replaced by a creepy little old man in an old-fashioned, dark suit, who walked through the thick security glass as if through water, saying: _I'm sorry, my boy, but this must be!_

And then there was a sharp pain piercing his guts, and he looked down at himself, watching with morbid fascination as his light blue shirt became soaked with blood.

_His_ blood.

Rhys gasped awake, drenched in cold sweat, and reached out for Gwen blindly. He needed to feel her solid presence to pull himself together again.

But the other half of the bed – Gwen's side – was empty and cold, her nighties thrown onto the floor carelessly. She must have left hours ago.

Sighing, Rhys climbed out of his sweat-soaked bed to check the bedside table, in the hope that Gwen had left a notice about where she'd gone and when she'd been back. He found none. Not that _that_ would have been anything new.

Ever since Captain Harkness had left, Gwen had been at home less than before. Oh, there were always reasonable explanations; after all, they were a man short, and work wasn't getting any less. Still, Rhys could not shake off the feeling that Gwen was lying to him.

Which wouldn't have been anything new, either. So much about the upcoming wedded bliss. Bloody Torchwood!

Knowing that he wouldn't be able to fall asleep again – and wondering how long it would take until chronic insomnia would start to influence his work – Rhys too a long, hot shower, then put on a terrycloth robe, fetched a beer from the fridge and sprawled out on the couch in front of the telly.

It was beyond midnight, but one of the commercial channels would have reruns of _Wife Swap_. He needed something normal, something down-to-earth and thoroughly silly to distract him.

* * *

Gwen was _not_ happy to find Rhys on the living room couch, surrounded by empty beer bottles, asleep with the telly still running. He'd been developing a resistance to the sleeping pills she secretly slipped into his food whenever she needed to leave without him asking questions, and that could become a problem in the long run.

She didn't want to Retcon him again, even if she could. She'd done so in the past year repeatedly, and she feared that he'd end up like Suzie's victims. She didn't want _that_ to happen. She needed him; the solid, normal background he provided – even though her _other _interests had long turned away from him.

Her short, torrid affair with Owen had been very satisfying – until that bastard would develop an interest for the woman from the 1950s who could have been his mother. Granted, she _hadn't_ been actually that old, due to the time travel aspect, but still… How would Owen _dare_ to drop her for someone like _that_?

And then there was Jack, of course. Jack, whose mere presence could make her week-kneed. Jack, with his ridiculous principles of not breaking up a stable relationship. Jack, who lowered himself to shagging the teaboy instead of finally stand up to his feelings like a man.

That bastard who'd run off with some mysterious alien – Gwen still didn't quite buy the whole legend about the Doctor, no matter what Tosh would say. What did Tosh know anyway – apart from freakish tech and computers, that is? And Ianto was lying whenever he opened his mouth.

But in the end, it didn't matter whom Jack had run off with – or why. What did matter was the fact that he _had_ run off, abandoning his team, his responsibilities, and the city he was supposed to protect.

Abandoning _her_.

_No-one_ abandoned Gwen Cooper for some random alien. And if they did, they were gonna pay the price.

With an anxious look at the softly snoring Rhys – she didn't want to wake him, now that he was finally asleep, and most certainly not at the moment, when she had such a delicate matter to handle – she tiptoed by him to the small room next to their bedroom that served as her study.

She booted up her computer and began to work on her report to that odd lot called UNIT. She still didn't fully understand what kind of organization it was, but if Tosh and Ianto were so afraid of them learning about Jack's disappearance, they would be the right people to contact. They would evaluate the situation and do what needed to be done.

Torchwood Three needed a new leader. And no matter what the others were blathering about, _she_ was the one Jack had chosen to replace his second-in-command. _She_ was the one with the people skills, the one with the connection to the police, the one who knew how a proper investigation should be done.

Under Jack's leadership, work at Torchwood Three had been chaotic at best. If they wanted to manage without him – who, at least, didn't need sleep and couldn't be killed, not for good anyway – they needed to be better organized… a bit like the police, actually.

There had to be a clear structure of responsibilities; a proper chain of command. She knew she would be able to establish that, eventually; the others would have to adapt. It was that simple. And once she'd broken her colleagues in, she could hire more people to work for Torchwood – to work for _her_.

But first she had to secure the position for herself. Before Ianto could lick the right boots up to whatever authorities had the right to choose a replacement for Jack. That lying little weasel had already started to worm his way into the confidence of the City Hall employees; a good thing that Carrie's hubby had informed Mr Grainger in time.

No support for the teaboy from that angle… and should Jack ever return, the photos Gwen had taken would show him that his opportunistic little bed-warmer had found somebody else soon enough. One way or another, Ianto was going to lose.

With a dark little smile, Gwen finished her report and consulted her phone, trying to find the best address to send it to. Unfortunately for her, none of the names in Jack's phone book appeared even vaguely familiar. Well, none save for that Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart Tosh and Ianto had mentioned; but they also said that the Brigadier was a friend of Jack's – and had retired years ago anyway.

Most names had various abbreviations attached to them; abbreviations she was unfamiliar with. She didn't want to go to the PM's office right away – Jack always said Torchwood was above the government. But not above UNIT, apparently… and what about the Home Office? The Secret Service? Couldn't _they_ do something?

She studied the names some more until she found one marked as both UNIT and MI5. Her eyes widened in surprise. That was _exactly_ what she needed! That must have been one of those people Jack had occasionally yelled at through the phone.

Grinning to herself in satisfaction, Gwen wrote a short message, attached her report and sent the whole thing to a certain Commodore Sullivan. Then she carefully wiped the Sent Messages folder in her mailing program, just in case Tosh or Ianto would try to hack into her computer. Again.

There; it was done. Now she could lean back and wait for the results.

* * *

Commodore Harry Sullivan was more than a little surprised when the message of an unknown woman arrived on his computer in the middle of the night.

Firstly because he only used this particular address to keep in touch with Jack Harkness and other ex-companions. Secondly because the woman introduced herself as the second-in-command of Torchwood Cardiff. And thirdly because she raised serious accusations against Jack Harkness, the one on top of her list, the most disturbing among them, being that Jack had abandoned his duties as the Torchwood leader and run off with some alien in a blue police box.

That particular piece of information told Sullivan more than it would tell most people. Those _not_ in the know would have found the description ridiculous. Sullivan, however, knew at once that Jack must have left with the Doctor – which, in itself, was unusual, to say the least.

The Doctor, not moving along the paths of linear time, usually didn't contact his former companions, in order to avoid causing a temporal paradox. The commodore himself hadn't seen the elusive Time Lord since the mid-1970s, although he knew that various incarnations of him _had_ visited Earth in the meantime. Repeatedly.

The last reported appearances were in Cardiff, during the earthquake in 2006, and a different incarnation in London, at the time of the unsuccessful Sycorax invasion. There were rumours that the same incarnation had been present at Canary Wharf, but no-one could actually prove _that_.

Still, that didn't mean that he couldn't have visited Cardiff recently. The commodore vaguely remembered Jack Harkness saying something about the TARDIS needing to be refuelled and the Rift being the right place to do so, and if the Doctor picked up an ex-companion again, he must have had a reason for that.

God knows Jack had waited long enough for him. One hundred years it had been? Or two hundred? Somewhere in-between, of that Sullivan was quite sure.

He read through the attachment again, his face getting increasingly grim in the process. Whoever this Gwen Cooper character was, obviously hated Jack very much – and wanted Jack's position badly. The accusations were severe: neglecting duties, covering up for horrible mistakes of team members – mistakes that put Cardiff at serious risk – for sexual favours, and now leaving the Rift in the care of untrained civilians…

It was pure, dumb luck that she happened to send this to Sullivan's address. The current brass of UNIT would happily discard Jack as unfit and move in to take over the Rift. They certainly wouldn't appoint one of _Jack_'s team as his successor. Without Jack, Torchwood Three would be dissolved in no time and turned into a UNIT outpost.

Had this stupid woman considered that? Apparently not. Perhaps she had no idea; or chose to ignore the risks. All she seemed to care about was to become the next Torchwood Three leader.

The commodore wondered how she might have found his address; perhaps by searching through Jack's things. After all, Jack had left rather abruptly; and he'd always been a bit careless with things he hadn't considered important.

Of course, if he didn't mean to come back, he wouldn't _need_ to be careful, right?

In any case Sullivan needed to learn more about Torchwood agent Gwen Cooper. And he needed to stop her, by any means necessary. Should she find out that she'd sent her little message of pure slander to the wrong address, she might give it a second try.

Or she might have already sent multiple letters, to all addresses she'd found in Jack's phone book. _That_ would be a disaster of epic proportions.

Still, Sullivan needed to move carefully. He no longer was in the position to intervene directly. After his stint with the NATO his function with both UNIT and MI5 was a consulting one. Would he start asking questions – by the Cardiff Police, for example, where Gwen Cooper had apparently worked before joining Torchwood, he'd draw a lot of unwanted attention to Torchwood Three.

For a few minutes he was thinking really hard. Then his eyes lit up in triumph.

"Of course, of course," he muttered. "I should have thought of her right away."

* * *

In the quiet of her house in Ealing, London, Sarah Jane Smith was startled when her phone rang in such an ungodly hour.

It wasn't the fact itself that somebody would call her in the middle of the night… well; morning would almost be more accurate. As a freelance journalist she was used to such things. After all, her informants often took a risk by telling her things she wasn't exactly supposed to know, and for some unfathomable reason most people seemed to believe that calling at night would be _safer_.

As if the listening devices would stop for sleep.

Not that _her_ phone could have been hacked, of course. Mr Smith made sure of that. Still, people tended to call at nighttime.

No, what surprised her was the fact that it was her second phone that rang. The clumsy, outdated model with the ring tone mimicking the noise the TARDIS made when landing. Or starting. The one she only used to keep in touch with other ex-companions, because it didn't have a GPS.

The one that hadn't rung… well, she couldn't even remember for how long.

The screen showed Harry's number, and she smiled involuntarily. Dear old Harry still called from time to time, checking on her. Making sure she was all right, even though their shared adventures lay in the past. In the _distant_ past. More distant than she liked to admit, to be honest.

Still, Harry calling her at such an unusual time was a tad worrying, and she picked up the phone in a great hurry.

"Harry, what's going on? Is the world about to end?"

"Not yet, at least I hope it isn't," the familiar voice of her old friend answered. "But something's definitely fishy. Did you know the Doctor was here again?"

"No," she said in surprise. "I haven't seen him – the _new_ him – since that incident with the Krillitanes at Deffry Vale school. Of course, he never bothers to drop by when he's in town," she added, with a slight bitterness. "It's nothing new."

"He wasn't in London; he was in Cardiff," Harry offered as some kind of consolation.

"That makes sense," she replied. 'He was probably refuelling the TARDIS. He does that from time to time, according to Jack – why is this case any different?"

"Because Jack's apparently gone with him," Harry said.

"Has he now?" Sarah Jane frowned a bit. "Then who's watching the Rift now?"

"That's the problem," Harry's voice was worried – a bad sign. After all he'd seen and experienced, Harry wasn't one to worry easily. "It seems that his team's tried to cover up his disappearance – except the one who's damn eager to get his job. She sent me a message with a detailed list of Jack's supposed shortcomings and her own skills that would apparently qualify her as the new Torchwood Three leader."

"_Nothing_ really qualifies one to lead Torchwood Three," Sarah Jane snorted. "All previous Torchwood Three leaders had come to a bad end. Could Jack stay dead, he'd be in one of those cryogenic tubes already, several times over. What does this woman make so sure she'd be better? What _is_ she? A former MI5 or MI6 agent? An android from outer space? The female reincarnation of James Bond?"

"A former police constable, apparently," Harry said dryly.

Sarah Jane was speechless for a long moment. Absolutely speechless. The mere idea of a PC – a _former_ PC – in charge of the Cardiff Rift boggled the mind.

"You're kidding, right?" she then said. "You _have_ to be kidding. Tell me that you _are_ kidding."

"Not at all, I'm afraid," Harry replied.

Sarah Jane still couldn't quite believe it. "Good gracious, is the woman _insane_? Does she really think that breaking up bar fights qualifies her to lead the most endangered outpost in the UK? And why did she write _you_, of all people? You never had anything to do with Torchwood and you aren't even with UNIT anymore."

"Perhaps she snatched Jack's phone book and chose the person with the most impressive-sounding titles," Harry joked humourlessly.

"That's bad, really bad," Sarah Jane said. "Worse than bad; it's a nightmare. Who knows whom else did she contact? Not everyone at UNIT likes Jack."

"That, I say, is the understatement of the century," Harry replied glumly. Jack, while generally capable of charming people out of their pants, was good at making enemies, too.

"We should alert the Brig," Sarah Jane said. "He still has _some_ influence. We might need him."

"I'll contact him first thing in the morning," Harry promised. "But there are other things to do, and I'll need your help, old thing."

"Don't call me _that_," Sarah Jane said automatically; some things never changed, which was actually comforting. "What can I possibly do? It's not so as if anyone at UNIT would listen to _me_, you know. They never did. Not even while I was travelling with the Doctor."

"Their loss," Harry replied, gallantly as always. "It doesn't matter. I need you to do what you do best: check on people and ferret out their secrets."

"You mean you need me to go to Cardiff and find out whatever I can about this woman," Sarah Jane translated the request.

"Aye," Harry said. "If you could discredit her a bit in the process, it would be even better."

"Hmmm," Sarah Jane weighed the possibilities against each other in her mind. "Well, I happen to have a former student in Cardiff who works for one of the local newspapers. She worked very doggedly on revealing Mayor Blaine's dubious nuclear project a couple of years ago… of course, she didn't know that Blaine was actually a Slitheen. What was her name again? Catie… no, Cathy. Cathy Salt. I can contact her and get her on the case."

"I'd prefer if you could go yourself, old girl."

"And I'd prefer if you could stop with the silly nicknames. They weren't funny thirty years ago and now they're positively insulting," Sarah Jane snapped. "Don't fret, I _will_ go to Cardiff. But I've got things to finish here first, and in the meantime Cathy can dig out the basic facts for me. She's very good at that."

"All right, let's do this your way," Harry sighed. "I'd sleep better if we could monitor her online correspondence, though. Do you think Mr Smith could do it?"

"I can try," Sarah Jane replied, a little uncertainly. "It couldn't be that complicated – unless she sends her messages from the Torchwood Hub. Not even Mr Smith can trick the Torchwood Mainframe."

"The mail sent to me came from her private address. I don't think she'd risk to send anything from the Hub where he others could catch her red-handed," Harry said. "All right, then. Let's keep in touch, shall we?"

"Always," Sarah Jane answered with a smile and hung up.

It felt good, working with Harry on saving the world again. Just like in old times.

* * *

The Hub was eerily quiet just before daybreak – but not empty. Never empty. It was a place full of ghosts.

Ghosts of former Torchwood agents, now lying still and cold and dead in the morgue, frozen for eternity.

The ones who had forcibly drafted Jack a century and a half ago.

The ones he had fought with, worked with in those long years, and inevitably lost – to malevolent aliens, to dangerous alien technology or simply to the passing of time that flowed past him like a river flows past an unmovable rock.

The ones he had found dead, killed by his predecessor – to _save_ them, apparently.

The ones he had to kill, in order to prevent something terrible from happening. Like Suzie.

Yes, the Hub was full of ghosts, which was why no-one liked to stay here alone. No-one but Ianto, that is, who had lived with his own ghosts for too long to still be bothered.

There was very little that could still bother him after Canary Wharf. Or after having lost Lisa for the second time.

Jack's departure was one of those things – and not only because it would set back the healing of his wounds by, oh, about a century or so. Apart from leaving him behind without a second thought, Jack had also dropped the responsibility for Torchwood Three onto his lap.

The Rift couldn't be left unwatched. Cardiff couldn't be left unprotected. Gwen was unfit for the job she so obviously desired. Tosh didn't want it and Owen… Owen was in no shape to do _any_ job at the moment, not even his regular one.

That left Ianto. Ianto who'd been longer part of Torchwood than any of them. Who'd been trained by Torchwood One thoroughly and who had, thanks to his photographic memory, all Torchwood secrets – or at least their location in the Archives – in his head.

He was the last Torchwood Archivist still alive.

Had UNIT known who – or rather _what_ – he was, he'd probably be dead by now, too. They'd have taken him to some secret lab, trying to extract the info from his brain. And then he wouldn't have had any other choice than to activate that tiny piece of alien tech embedded deeply in his cranium and trigger self-destruction.

He had sworn a solemn oath to keep Torchwood's secrets from falling into the wrong hands – and he knew all too well the dangers, so he would fulfil that oath voluntarily.

That meant he had to hold things firmly in his own hand – if only to keep those secrets safe from Gwen's constant nosing around. That she was ruthless in her pursuing her own agenda the security cameras hidden in Jack's office had already shown. So Ianto used the night to take preventive measures.

The first step had been to clean out Jack's office. Ianto emptied the desk completely, save for the piles of paperwork waiting for someone – for _him_, as usual – to deal with them. He removed the rusty old thin box from the bottom drawer – the box containing old photos from Jack's past, which he never got to see but knew they existed – and took it down to Jack's room, where he buried it in the hindmost corner of the wardrobe. Then he sealed the room and put a security lock on the trap door.

He would come down to air and clean the room from time to time, but no-one else would enter it. Least of all Gwen-bloody-Cooper.

He then methodically removed every piece of alien tech lying around haphazardly in Jack's office – the man could be really messy at times – returned them to the Archives and changed all the security passwords, just in case Jack had carelessly told Gwen any of them. He also changed the access code to the safe in Jack's office, where the truly dangerous objects were kept.

"I'll tell Tosh about it later," he muttered to himself.

"You'll tell me about what?" a soft voice asked from behind his back, and he whirled around, startled that she'd managed to get in without him noticing.

Until he remembered that he'd turned off the alarm himself, so that he'd be able to move in and out in peace.

"The new security codes," he replied, giving Tosh a tired smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "What are you doing here, Tosh? You should be at home, resting."

She smiled back at him, equally tiredly and more than just a little sadly.

"So should you. And yet here we are, both of us. Couldn't sleep, eh?"

"Too many nightmares, ever since Canary Wharf," Ianto sighed. "The recent weeks weren't helping, either. You?"

"The same," Tosh admitted. "Every time I close my eyes I see Bilis Manger – or Jack, lying in the morgue. What are you doing, Ianto?"

"Securing the Hub," he explained. "Making sure that only you and me can access any confidential information."

"Is that fair to the others?" she asked quietly. "Owen…"

"Owen wouldn't care; not in his current shape," Ianto interrupted. "And Gwen has already searched Jack's office; taking photographs of his phone book, with all the secret numbers; that of the UNIT liaison, of MI5, MI6, the Prime Minister's office, the Home Office… in her hands, they could be dangerous. You know what she's like, doing the first thing that occurs to her, without thinking of the possible consequences."

Tosh paled imagining those consequences.

"What can we do to counteract?" she asked.

"First of all, I want those numbers deleted from her phone; replaced with completely harmless ones would be even better. Could Mainframe hack into the phone, what do you think?"

Tosh bit her lower lip, thinking.

"I'm not sure," she confessed. "But I can give it a try."

"Please do," Ianto was visibly relieved. "And when you're already at it, try to set up a few firewalls that would limit her access to the database as much as possible. I don't want her poke around in my Digital Archives."

"Do you really think it's necessary?" Tosh was mildly shocked by his request.

Ianto nodded. "Oh, yes. Those databases should have been password-protected from the beginning, but Jack had a bit of a lash attitude towards security. If he hadn't, the whole disaster with Suzie and the resurrection glove could have been prevented. That is something I wouldn't like to face again."

Tosh couldn't argue with that, and so she sat down to her desk to do as Ianto had asked.

~TBC~


	5. Chapter 5: Inquiries

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Summary:** Jack is gone, and the rest of the Torchwood Three team must see how they manage without him.

**Author's note:** I apologize for the shortness of this chapter, but this seemed to be the best place to stop.

Many thanks to the picowrimo crowd on LJ for the grammar and phrasing.

* * *

**Chapter 05 – Inquiries**

The mysterious deaths of the recent days – dozens of people had died in Cardiff within a single day, little more than a week ago, for reasons no-one could explain – left the local police with a sheer unsolvable problem. They had the morgue of several hospitals full of dead bodies and couldn't explain to the upset relatives what might have happened to their loved ones.

"Have the post mortems come up with any conclusive cause for their deaths?" Detective Kathy Swanson asked tiredly.

Like most in the force, she'd had next to no sleep for the last week, hadn't seen her little daughter save for stolen moments when the child wasn't even awake, and was so numb with exhaustion that she couldn't even care. Which was the most frightening aspect of the whole disaster.

"Nope," Desk Sergeant Paul Bronowski handed her a pile of autopsy reports. "Apparently, people just… stopped. Or rather their hearts did – from one moment to another. Some kind of deep shock."

"Nonsense," Detective Trefor Pugh, the most senior of them, a short, stocky man in his mid-forties, snorted. "A hundred and thirty-eight people of various ages, social standings and health condition don't just die of the same thing at the same time without a reason."

"Except that _these_ did," Detective M'Benga, a slender back man with a clean-shaven head, commented cynically. "Unless you count the shadow of the Devil that supposedly fell over them, that is."

Swanson rolled her eyes. "Spare me the Apocalypse, Geoff."

"Well, the biblical signs were certainly there," Bronowski said, and it was hard to tell whether he was joking or speaking seriously. "The outbreak of the Black Death, the Beatles on the roof of Abbey Road Studios, guillotine appearances in Paris, samurai warriors on the rampage in the Tokyo subway system…"

"UFOs above Taj Mahal, monsters in Halloween masks roaming the streets in Cardiff, people clad like Roman soldiers stabbing people with spears in Penarth, people seeing their dead relatives… the only thing that didn't happen was the return of Elvis," added M'Benga, grinning.

"Mass hysteria," Pugh dismissed it all. "Or hallucinogens in the water system. I'm sure those freaks from Torchwood had something to do with it."

"Speaking of the devil," Swanson looked over to the desk where her PA and flatmate, Eiry Conway was sitting and comparing what little useful data they had. "Have we heard from Harkness yet? Or from any of the others?"

The pleasantly plump woman shook her head. "Nothing since PC Davidson phoned them and they took that supposed Roman soldier out of our hands."

"That's odd," Swanson said with a frown. "Normally, they'd be all over the place, lording it over us, as if they owned the city. Have they ever been seen lately?"

Eiry shook her head again. "Not at any of the crime scenes. Cooper met those annoying friends of hers in their usual place and Jones was seen in the _Old Sailor_ with that young bloke from the City Hall, Idris Hopper, a couple of days ago. The others haven't shown their faces at all. As if they hadn't left their base for days. _Including_ Harkness."

"I wonder if they know we've put tracking devices on all their cars," M'Benga grinned.

"Hardly," Pugh replied with a snort. "Or they'd have removed all pieces already."

"Or they simply don't care cos they know we're powerless against them," Swanson said. "All right, people, if there aren't any new dead bodies we should call it a day. We all need some decent sleep."

"Including you," Eiry pointed out.

"Oh, I intend to get some, believe me!" Swanson answered with feeling. "As soon as I've finished my long overdue report for Detective Inspector Henderson I'm _so_ out of here. Although _what_ I'm gonna tell him I still haven't got the foggiest. We have _nothing_. _Literally_ nothing."

"Apart from a hundred and thirty-eight dead bodies," M'Benga said. "And no visible reason for them to _be_ dead."

"Thanks, Geoff, that really makes me feel _so_ much better," Swanson's voice was dripping with sarcasm. "Now, off with you all. In five minutes I don't want to see here anyone who isn't on the graveyard shift."

Barely had the words left her mouth, she regretted them already. Among the one hundred and thirty-eight mysterious deaths four were from their own precinct, and another seven friends and family members of them. Ever since then, people studiously avoided calling the late night watch graveyard shift. It clearly showed how exhausted she was that she'd managed to forget about it.

The others tactfully pretended not to have noticed her _faux pas_ and filed out of the shared office, one after another – until she was left alone with her PA who was also packing already. The babysitter would leave within the hour, and in such cases Eiry took over the task of watching little Neesha.

"Anything else I should know about before you leave?" Swanson asked.

"Nothing conclusive,"" Eiry replied, checking her list of incoming phone calls. "Unless you count the call of Ms Salt… you know, the science correspondent of the _Cardiff Gazette_ who revealed the scandal about Mayor Blaine a couple of years ago."

Swanson sighed. Ms Salt was one of those journalists that could drive her to distraction. While her writing style counted as a bit dry and pedantic, Cathy Sand was like a bloodhound. She had a unique gift to sniffle out scandals; and once she was on the track, no-one could distract her.

A hundred and thirty-eight unexplained deaths were right up her street.

"What did she want?" Swanson asked resignedly.

"That's the odd part of it," Eiry replied. "She wanted information about Gwen Cooper."

Swanson stared at her PA in stunned disbelief. "Why should _anyone_ want to know anything about _Cooper_?"

"She said something about planning to write a series on women in unusual jobs," Eiry said slowly. "But I think there's more behind it."

"You mean Cooper might have messed up something colossally?" Swanson asked. "I won't be surprised. How she managed to finish police school with an award for best behaviour is beyond everyone's imagination… unless the performance in the broom closet was the only thing that counted."

Eiry shrugged. "Men are alike in many things; including in accepting that which is offered freely. I only feel sorry for Rhys. He would deserve better treatment."

"Wouldn't most of us?" Swanson commented rhetorically. "All right, make an appointment with Ms Salt; it's better I talk to her than the Detective Inspector. He's got a lot less tolerance for the press, and our public image is bad enough as it is."

* * *

"So, what did you find out?" Sarah Jane asked her former pupil.

They were sitting in her room in _St. David's Hotel_, which she'd searched thoroughly in advance for listening devices before inviting Cathy over. To her relief, she found none. Her arrival clearly remained unnoticed by both Torchwood and the local authorities… not that _that_ would be surprising. The only person who'd have reacted to her name was supposedly gone – which had brought her to Cardiff in the first place.

Cathy Salt shrugged. With her mousey brown hair and outdated beehive hairdo she was singularly unremarkable. No-one would have expected the razor sharp mind – _or_ the considerable scientific knowledge – behind that bland façade. She was the science correspondent of the _Cardiff Gazette_ for a reason, though. Her marks might not have been good enough for a career _as_ a scientist, but she certainly understood the basics much better than the average journalist.

A fact that had nearly cost her her life, back in 2006, when she'd started snooping around the highly questionable Blaidd Dwrg project.

"Not much of real interest," she admitted. "Miss Cooper was apparently fairly new at the police when she left them to join Torchwood, less than a year ago. A beat cop, basically; still too much of a rookie to be assigned to anything more important than walking the beat and serving coffee on police meetings. She had a one-time romp with her then-partner, a PC Davidson, who still seems to have a crush on her, and she uses his affections to get info out of him at times."

"Do the police have any records on her activities while _with_ Torchwood?" Sarah Jane asked. Cathy nodded.

"Lots of it. Mostly reports on trespassing at crime scenes, even if those didn't have anything to do with Torchwood, not even marginally. But that's something our police are used from Torchwood since Captain Harkness had taken over. In one case, though, she was suspected to have stabbed somebody – a certain Mr Ed Morgan – but that was later filed away as an unfortunate accident. The victim apparently attacked her and ran into the knife she was holding."

"She was holding a _knife_?" Sarah Jane frowned. "With the pointy edge upwards? Why on Earth would she do such a stupid thing?"

Cathy shrugged again. "No idea. According to Detective Swanson, Captain Harkness pulled ranks, and the case was closed pretty much on the spot."

That sounded a lot like Jack indeed, but Sarah Jane found it better to keep that piece of knowledge to herself.

"What else?" she asked instead.

"Well, she seems a bit clumsy and accident-prone," Cathy studied her notes. "It seems no-one in Torchwood gets injured so often as she does. Remember about those cannibals in the Brecon Beacons?"

Sarah Jane nodded. The media were full of blood-churning stories about that, with all the gory details and sickening photos they could dig out.

"You say Torchwood was involved?" she asked.

"Yep; apparently, they went on some camping trip – team-building it's called; an American thing, but Captain Harkness _is_ American, isn't he? In any case, they got caught by the local weirdoes and nearly eaten. Cooper got a shotgun wound and their office boy was beaten up brutally; a shame, that, as he's a nice bloke."

"But they did get out in one piece, didn't they?"

"Oh, yes; it's said that Captain Harkness all but levelled the house with a _tractor_ and shot a dozen or so people… didn't kill them, mind you, but he did save his team single-handedly. It was like a bad American action film, according to the paramedics who were called to take care of the wounded."

Again, that was something Sarah Jane could imagine all too well. Jack did have a lot of an American action hero in his make-up, and storming a house full of armed cannibals to save his team was exactly the thing he would do.

"You spoke to the paramedics?" she asked.

"Of course!" Cathy sounded almost insulted. "I may not be the crime correspondent, but this was the biggest story of the year! Besides, I always do some investigation on my own whenever Torchwood is involved."

"Why?" Sarah Jane admitted to herself that she was a bit concerned. Cathy on a trail, as she'd told Harry, was a force of nature. If she found out that Jack was gone…

"Torchwood is a mystery," Cathy explained. "In fact, it is _the_ mystery of Cardiff. It's been a mystery since the 19th century, and I find mysteries irresistible."

"Just be careful," Sarah Jane warned. "I don't know the Cardiff branch, but Torchwood London was known for their ruthless methods in dealing with those who were caught snooping around them. Anyway, tell me more about this Cooper woman. Why do you say she's clumsy? Anyone can get shot by a gun, unfortunately."

"Yep; especially when charging into a house without waiting for the more experienced people, in a village known for guileless travellers vanishing in it," Cathy commented dryly.

Sarah Jane raised an eyebrow. "The police have an impressive amount of detail on Torchwood operations, I see."

"No, they don't," Cathy said. "But I happened to run into their Dr Harper in a bar, and drunk men tend to tell a lot of things when a woman is listening compassionately. Things they'd never speak of when sober."

Oh God, this was worse than expected! The medical officer of Torchwood pouring out his heart (and his secrets) to a journalist in a pub was every security officer's worst nightmare. It seemed that Gwen Cooper wasn't the only weak link in Jack's team.

"I see your point," Sarah Jane said. "What else is there?"

"I left the best for the end," Cathy grinned mirthlessly. "A couple of weeks later Cooper helped some rogue former Torchwood agent to escape from their cells and nearly got killed by her in exchange."

"A _rogue_ former agent?" Sarah Jane repeated in stunned disbelief.

She knew that there were only two ways to leave Torchwood: through Retcon or in a coffin. An agent that could resist the thorough mind-wipe had to be very dangerous.

"It seems they thought her dead but she wasn't, after all; something like that, the details are a bit blurred," Cathy explained. "Anyway, she dished up some clichéd tale about a dying father, Cooper bought it and helped her escape. On their way out, she locked down the Torchwood base, with the rest of the team within, took Cooper hostage and fled with her car. The police were full in this one, as Captain Harkness needed Detective Swanson's help to break the security code and get out of his own base. The coppers still get laughing fits when the case is mentioned."

Sarah Jane didn't feel like laughing about it. At all. That there could be such thing as a rogue Torchwood agent escaping the usual mind-wipe and returning to play havoc with the only still functional Torchwood team was bad enough. That another Torchwood agent would be stupid enough to buy into some sentimental crap and help the finally contained rogue to escape, giving her the chance to successfully cut off the entire Torchwood base was even worse. The fact that the same inexperienced rookie was trying to gain control over Torchwood by making _Jack_ look bad – Jack-bloody-Harkness, who'd been working for Torchwood for a century and a half! – was a disaster begging to happen.

The woman needed to be stopped, by any means necessary, or the consequences could no longer be safely foreseen.

"Anything else?" she asked.

"Nothing worth mentioning," Cathy studied her notes again. "Apparently, Cooper harassed the police to investigate the death of some loser by the name of Eugene Jones cos she believed he'd been murdered."

"Was he?" Sarah Jane asked sharply, but Cathy shook her head.

"It seems to have been a simple car accident; one of the many that happen on that particular road every year. Cooper herself nearly got run over by a car while snooping around. Other than that, she's simply being an annoyance. As the police liaison, she likes bossing around the police at crime scenes – especially her former partner – so that they no longer talk to her… well, save for PC Davidson, who's too loyal a soul for his own good. But whenever Detective Swanson needs to discuss something of importance with Torchwood, she usually calls Jones."

She closed her notebook and shrugged. "I'm sorry; this is all I could find out in such a short notice. I can try to corner Jones, though…"

Sarah Jane shook her head. "No; this would do for the time being. Thank you, Cathy."

"Don't mention it," Cathy hesitated for a moment. "Sarah Jane, is there any particular reason you're so interested in this Cooper woman? I mean, there's nothing outstanding about her, save perhaps her delusions of grandeur. She's as common as dirt; and not particularly intelligent, either. Does this have something to do with Captain Harkness's disappearance?"

"_What_?" Sarah Jane stared at her former pupil in shock. "How on Earth can _you_ possibly know about that?"

"Geoffrey, that's my husband, is a civil servant, working for the City Council," Cathy explained. "He's heard it from one of his colleagues, Huw Cadman, whose wife is a friend of this Cooper character. Torchwood is obviously trying to cover up the fact that their boss is gone, but I know that Huw told it Mr Grainger, so it's more or less official now," she gave Sarah Jane a searching look. "You knew this already, didn't you?"

Sarah Jane nodded. "Jack Harkness is a dear of friend of mine. If he had to go on some undercover mission without telling his team about it, he must have had his reasons. Very good reasons, in fact."

"Then why are _you_ investigating?" Cathy asked.

"Because I find it disturbing that one of his own people would try backstabbing him as soon as he's left town," Sarah Jane replied grimly. "I asked you to do a little snooping around for me because you're a local and had the better chance to actually get some answers. But you have to understand that this must not go any further. Everything Torchwood does is covered by the Official Secrets Act; leaking things would endanger the national security and there are organizations that deal with people who do the leaking quickly and very, _very_ efficiently."

Cathy gnawed her lower lip for a moment; then she nodded.

"All right," she said. "But tell whoever makes the final decisions that I want in. I won't publish anything, I'll sign the Official Secrets Act if I have to, but I want a look at their base. _And_ an interview with whoever gets to lead them in Captain Harkness's absence. Even if it can only be disclosed a hundred years after my death, I want to make the first ever report about Torchwood."

"I'll see what I can do," Sarah Jane said with a sigh.

* * *

"Absolutely _not_!" Commodore Sullivan roared when the topic was broached to him. "Out of question! Not in a thousand years!

"Why not?" Sarah Jane asked. "It isn't as if Torchwood would be such a big secret – at least, in Cardiff it certainly isn't. And they could use a press liaison who actually knows what they're doing and helps them cover up things."

"Yeah, sure," Sullivan snorted.

"Harry, stop it!" Sarah Jane said sternly. "Cathy Salt is a serious journalist, not some tabloid reporter. A science correspondent whose help in decking up Margaret Blaine's Blaidd Dwrg project was invaluable. People _believe_ her because she _knows_ what she's talking about. And Torchwood has a bad enough reputation due to Jack's tendency to steamroll everyone in his way. They could use a bit of positive press."

"Jack wouldn't like the press being involved in any way," Sullivan promised.

Sarah Jane shrugged. "Probably not. But he's apparently run off with the Doctor, without leaving instructions for his team, and if we don't move quickly, he may not _have_ a team when he comes home. _If_ he comes back at all, now that he found what he'd been waiting for all this time."

"The Doctor," Sullivan nodded.

"The right kind of Doctor," Sarah Jane corrected. "Not ours, not Ace's, not Ian and Barbara's. _His _Doctor."

"Having so many different versions of him at such different times can be a trifle confusing," Sullivan said pensively. "But if Jack isn't planning to come back. Torchwood Three will need a new leader."

"Torchwood Three will need a new leader no matter what," Sara Jane replied in concern. There's no way to tell _when_ Jack will be back – if ever. Even if the Doctor _is_ planning to bring him back in a couple of hours after his departure, we both know that the TARDIS is a bit unreliable when it comes to short-time travels, both through space _and_ time. They may show up in Cardiff yesterday – or on the South Pole before the most recent ice age. Everything is possible."

"True," Sullivan admitted. "However, it's not our place to make such a decision. Torchwood answers to the Crown directly; only Her Majesty can decide about its future."

"Fortunately, she likes Jack," Sarah Jane smiled. "I still remember how shocked I was when I realized the _Lizzie_ Jack so casually spoke of was actually the Queen herself."

Sullivan grinned. "So was I. But Jack used to bounce her on his knees while she was barely more than a baby – and protected her from both local and extraterrestrial scum in her youth. Still, she won't hesitate to replace him – or to hand the Rift over to UNIT – should she come to the conclusion that the safety of the country is at risk. She takes her responsibilities _very_ seriously."

"_Somebody_ has to," Sarah Jane replied dryly. "Most people show a way too casual attitude when it comes to outside treats. Especially to alien ones."

She was speaking of the new set of UNIT brass, of course, who were dangerously overconfident and thought they could deal with everything, just because they'd pilfered some minor pieces of alien technology from the ruins of Torchwood One. Which reminded Sullivan that he really needed to do some digging of his own to discover where all the stuff from Torchwood Tower had gone. As soon as they had dealt with the current crisis, that is.

"I say, you're absolutely right, old girl," he said, ignoring her death glare. "Which is why I've consulted the Brig while you were in Cardiff. He agrees with me that Her Majesty needs to be informed and has already asked for a private audience for us both. In the meantime, we should try to find out everything there is to know about the current Torchwood Three members – _and_ about the survivors of Canary Wharf."

"What for?" she asked, somewhat confused by the sudden change of topics.

"To see if there are any potential candidates among them," Sullivan explained. "If Jack needs to be replaced, an insider would be the best choice to take over for him… if we can find one fit for the job. The Brig and I might have to make suggestions, should the situation become grave."

~TBC~


	6. Chapter 6: The Summoning

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Author's note:** Yes, I know I've messed up the Dr Who/Torchwood timeline. But this is an AU, in which Jack is, in fact, absent for several months before returning. So the differences are intended. Including Ianto being recruited by Torchwood London a lot earlier.

* * *

**Chapter 06 – The Summoning**

A mere two days later, in London, at Buckingham Palace, Her Majesty the Queen was giving a most unusual audience. Unusual in the sense that she had called this particular meeting herself, to deal with one of the very few issues in which she actually held the power of decision alone. She was about to decide the future of Torchwood.

The men she had summoned to consult with were highly decorated military officers of the old school, for which the honour of serving Queen and Country was still of utmost importance. They were, consequently, of her own generation; old yet shrewd and powerful, with all their wits around them and not afraid of making – or suggesting – hard decisions.

One of them, Sir Alistair Lethbridge-Steward, commonly known as the Brigadier (or The Brig), was a dear old friend of hers. But beyond that, he had once been the supreme commander of UNIT and still held a great deal of influence and weight within the British division. The other one, Commodore Harry Sullivan, she had rarely met before. But she knew that the Naval officer and surgeon had once worked with both the Brigadier _and_ the Doctor – the time-travelling alien that had played such in important role in British history – and about him she still was of two minds. The Commodore later served as the Deputy Director of MI5 and was currently closely affiliated with the NATO.

They were both men of _weitblick_ and great experience when it came to alien life and the stopping of potential invasions. They had also both worked with Torchwood for decades – granted, mostly with the London branch, but that did not matter in the current crisis. In these days, Torchwood basically meant the small outpost monitoring the Cardiff Rift, and that particular outpost was being on the verge of collapse right now.

Her Majesty had also invited to this meeting her oldest grandson, the second in the line to inherit the throne. Unlike his father, Prince William – who had just ended his intensive training course at RAF Cranwell and earned his pilot's wings – was greatly interested in aliens and their technology; should they decide to keep Torchwood after all, the organization would need a staunch supporter within the royal family.

"I shan't live forever," she explained with disarming honesty, "and I would hate to see the creation of Her Majesty the Queen Victoria fall to shambles due to negligence."

"Defence Minister Saxon doesn't seem to take the alien threat seriously," the Brigadier commented. "And Prince Charles seems to agree with him."

"Which is why I invited William to this meeting instead of his father," the Queen answered dryly. "If anything, the Sycorax invasion has proved that we _need_ Torchwood. Without their knowledge about alien technology and weapons we would never have been able to shoot down that alien spaceship threatening London."

"I thought the Doctor dealt with the Sycorax," the Brigadier said, surprised.

"That Doctor of yours debated with the aliens, fought a ritual duel with their leader, and then let them leave, with a vague promise that they won't return," the Queen said dismissively. "Forgive me, Sir Alistair, but I would rather entrust the safety of this kingdom to solid defensive weaponry than to the dubious goodwill of some visiting alien who might or might not come to our rescue if we are on the verge of complete destruction. Especially to one who was petty enough to destroy the career of Prime Minister Jones, out of spite for having crossed his lofty ideals."

She was still very upset about _that_ fact. She had liked Harriet Jones, a solid, honest, reliable back-bencher-turned-Prime-Minister, and could not forgive the Doctor for starting the rumours about Harriet's ill health, which had ultimately led to the vote of no confidence. Practically preparing the way for Harold Saxon to take over… which, sadly, seemed inevitable when one watched the tendencies closely enough. Last time she had checked, Saxon had led the poll by sixty-four per cent, and that was unsettling news.

For some reason, Her Majesty deeply mistrusted Harold Saxon. The man was too smooth-mannered, too happy and excited all the time to be real. She did not trust him… she couldn't quite explain why, but she did not. There was something in that man's eyes that made her shiver.

She shook herself slightly and returned to the more pressing problem at hand. She'd deal with Saxon later, if she had to.

"Gentlemen, the matter in which we need to decide now it the very future of Torchwood. We were forced to close Torchwood London after the Battle of Canary Wharf, and UNIT is still dealing with the aftermath. Currently Torchwood consists of two minor outposts, in Glasgow and Cardiff, respectively, and of Torchwood House itself, which is in need of a new curator. The question is: can we still afford to keep it running? As much as I'd regret the necessity of closing down an organization that had served the Crown faithfully for so long, do we still truly need it?"

"Yes, Ma'am," Commodore Sullivan answered promptly. "At the very least we need the Cardiff branch. The Rift must be watched closely; and Torchwood Cardiff has done a fairly good job of it in the last two hundred years, give or take a few."

"Couldn't UNIT take over these outposts?" asked Prince William. "They are practically in the same line of work, and frankly, they are better organized and better trained. At least the British division is. I was impressed by Colonel Mace's leading abilities when I visited the UNIT Headquarters last year."

"They could," the Brigadier said. "But I don't think they should. "If we pass the guardianship of the Rift over to UNIT, Her Majesty would lose control over the most dangerous spot in the United Kingdom. I don't think that would be wise. Yes, Colonel Mace is a decent chap and a good officer, but the Crown has no influence over his staying or leaving – or who might come after him."

"And you think Torchwood is the best solution?" Prince William still didn't seem very certain about that. Colonel Mace must have made a lasting impression.

"I'm not so sure anymore," the Brigadier answered slowly. "Without Harkness, mattes cold go downhill really quickly there. His way of dealing with things might have been unorthodox at best – it certainly drove Yvonne Hartmann up the walls – but he'd worked for Torchwood Cardiff for a century and a half and Cardiff is still there and Earth hasn't been invaded yet… not through the Rift, anyway. So aye, I'd prefer Torchwood _with_ Harkness, rather than without him."

"Unfortunately, that's no longer an option," Prince William pointed out.

The Brigadier nodded unhappily. "I know, Your Highness; which is why we chose to inform Her Majesty as soon as we learned about Harkness' disappearance."

"Do you still think Torchwood should remain in charge of the Rift, though?" the Queen asked; both officers nodded. "Very well; I will take that under consideration. Who is still left of the team?"

Four people," Commodore Sullivan took a manila folder out of his briefcase and handed it to Her Majesty who opened it and handed the personal files within to her grandson to study them. "Medical officer Dr Owen Harper, recruited by Harkness in 2005. Computer expert Dr Toshiko Sato, bailed out of a secret UNIT prison by Harkness to work for him in the late 2003; her five years of indenture are still running. General Support Officer Ianto Jones, recruited right out of university by Torchwood _One_ in early 2003; he's one of the survivors of Canary Wharf. And police liaison Gwen Cooper, recruited by Harkness less than a year ago, after the death of his second-in-command, Suzie Costello."

"Not much of a team," Prince William commented dismissively. "And one of them was imprisoned by _UNIT_? What for?"

The Brigadier hesitated, not wanting to expose Toshiko, whom he genuinely liked; besides, how was he supposed to tell the future king that she had been imprisoned for high treason? Fortunately, the Queen came to his rescue.

"This is a delicate matter, William; one that should not be discussed right now," she said. "You will be debriefed when you step in my place; until then it is not your concern. Let's just say that pardoning her was a decision that I thought about very carefully – and never regretted. She's a genius and she's very loyal... as a rule. What happened to her wasn't entirely her fault. Still, she's not the person I'd want to see in a leading position."

"She wouldn't want it, either," the Brigadier said. "She's a specialist, and so is Dr Harper. They should be kept within their comfort zone, where they work most efficiently."

"What about the other two?" Prince William asked, leafing through the files. "An office boy and an ex-police constable… neither is the proper candidate for leadership, I deem."

Commodore Sullivan hesitated for a moment before laying his best card on the table – figuratively speaking.

"Ianto Jones is a great deal more than just the office boy," he said. "He is the last surviving archivist of Torchwood London."

"What?" the Brigadier exclaimed. "But I thought they were all dead!"

"All save him. That's correct."

"Then why is he labelled here as a junior researcher?" Prince William stared at the file with a frown.

Sullivan sighed. "Because he was still in training when the Battle of Canary Wharf happened. _All_ of Rupert Howarth's protégées were labelled as junior researchers at first. Jones was his favourite; I think he wanted the boy to take over his job eventually. Ina bout thirty years or so."

"How did he end up as the office boy in Cardiff, then?" the Queen asked in surprise. Unlike her grandson, she was aware of the demands towards a Torchwood Archivist… and what they were capable of.

"Perhaps he didn't want to be vivisected by UNIT," the Brigadier answered dryly. "It was healthier that way. By UNIT's current attitude, some people wouldn't have hesitated to cut his brain in pieces to extract the secret codes and passwords of Torchwood One."

"And they'd have failed," Sullivan added, mostly for the sake of the Prince. "All Torchwood Archivists had a cranial implant that could kill them, quickly and painlessly, if someone tried to get info from them – be it by drugs or by torture. I don't blame him that he didn't want to get into a situation where he'd have to trigger it."

"Which basically means that all secrets we thought lost through the destruction of Torchwood One are safely nested in the head of a twenty-four-year-old?" the Queen shook her head in disdain. "Was it responsible to load such a burden on somebody who's still barely more than a child?"

"I don't think he actually _knows_ everything," Sullivan said. "The brain activity required for handing such amounts of knowledge would kill him. I believe he knows the passwords and the access codes and the general layout of the Torchwood Archives, so that he can _find_ anything if necessary."

"That, in its final effect, is basically the same," Prince William said. "Meaning that he's extremely valuable for us. But does it make him fit for leadership, too? If he's a survivor of Canary Wharf, he must be suffering from severe PTSD – can we appoint such a theoretically broken man to lead one of the most important outposts against alien attacks? What about this ex-policewoman? Would she not be better suited? At least she's a few years older."

"Hardly," Sullivan replied dryly. "For starters, she's a rookie at best. And as soon as Captain Harkness disappeared, her first impulse was to send a report to UNIT, listing up his failings and why she would be the ideal replacement. It's a good thing that she accidentally sent the message to me, or we'd be up to our eyeballs in damage control. I wouldn't trust her with my shopping list, save such an important outpost. She's way too indiscreet and way too ambitious for my taste."

"Are you telling me that the rest of the team wanted to cover up the disappearance of Captain Harkness?" the Queen frowned. "For what reason?"

Sullivan shrugged. "Perhaps they hoped he'd come back, soon… although the Doctor's timing has always been lousy. He often erred by several years… or decades, or centuries even – and ended up on the wrong planet more than once. _Or_ they didn't want UNIT to march in and take over, which I can understand and agree with."

"At least in Dr Sato's case it's understandable," Prince William admitted; then he looked at his grandmother askance. "So; what are we… what are _you_ going to do?"

The Queen gave the matter some serious thought before answering.

"First, I want to meet young Mr Jones," she finally said. "It seems to me that he's the key to Torchwood's continued existence, in whatever position he'd end up. And then, Brigadier, I want you to find out how many of the Canary Wharf survivors are available and still willing to work for Torchwood. Because the Cardiff outpost will need more people if it has to keep going on."

* * *

Ianto spent the couple of weeks after Jack's disappearance in tense expectation. AS he'd been just a day or two late with cleaning out Jack's office, Gwen had gained the first move, and now he couldn't do anything else but wait. He couldn't know if Gwen had already contacted anyone on Jack's list before Tosh would manage to hack into her phone and change the copied numbers; and that made him nervous.

At least they had prevented any further harm – or so he hoped. The altered numbers now connected to completely harmless places. To dry cleaners. To take-away services. To a dentist's practice. To a car mechanic's. Even to a couple of seedy gay bars, proving that Tosh had, indeed, a wicked sense of humour if she let her hair down.

In any case, the numbers were useless for Gwen, though Ianto would have liked to see her face, should she try to contact the UNIT liaison, for example, only to end up by a male stripper whose speciality was to perform in various military uniforms.

Still, she _did_ have the real numbers for a couple of days, and there was the distinct possibility that she'd already used the one or other, trying to secure herself a leading position within Torchwood Three.

Or rather _the_ leading position, which seemed to be her main agenda.

The fact that her Sent folder had been wiped clean right after her little break into Jack's office only cemented Ianto's suspicions. Unfortunately, while Mainframe _could_ hack into her computer as long as it was connected to the internet – not even Tosh's help was required for _that_ – thy would have to bring the hard drive physically into the Hub to reconstruct the deleted messages.

Ianto briefly considered crating a fake Rift alarm and stealing her computer while the others were hunting nonexistent aliens, but in the end he decided against it. It was too much ado for too little prospective results; and they could do little else than wait for the move of whomever Gwen might have contacted anyway.

Plus, there was always the odd chance to find Rhys at home, and he'd been Retconned often enough by Gwen during the recent year for no acceptable reasons for Ianto to avoid risking to do so again.

So he forced himself to wait which, although he was a patient soul, wasn't easy for him. He preferred the dangers he already knew, so that he could prepare himself for the fight that was coming well in advance. This uncertainty gnawed on his nerves badly.

Fortunately (?), the Rift had been fairly volatile in these last weeks – just as Jack had predicted it would be. They had several alerts each day, and since they were only four people now and Owen a useless drunk most of the time, Ianto had no other choice than to go out with the others.

That proved a blessing. Running after Weevils or hunting down weird alien tech put his mind off his other concerns. Besides, he could keep up with the best of them. He might have been a junior Archivist at One, but training at Headquarters had been thorough and brutal, and he was a crack shot. Plus he was still fairly young, so he actually enjoyed all the action.

It was in the evenings, which grew further and further into the night, while he was trying to catch up with the accumulated paperwork, when his concerns returned. Sitting in Jack's office, with only the ghosts of Torchwood's past as his company (and occasionally Tosh, who was still working on new, stronger firewalls against any possible intrusions) he admitted to himself that he almost wanted the bombshell to finally drop.

_Anything_ would be better than this helpless waiting.

When the bombshell _did_ drop, however, it wasn't what he'd been accepting. Not at all.

* * *

It was a relatively quiet Friday afternoon. They'd had several Weevil sightings on that day – harmless incidents, thank God; the Weevils had merely strayed from their usual paths and could be driven back to the sewers without bloodshed, which counted as success in these days - but no actual Rift alarm so far. So Ianto persuaded Gwen to go home to Rhys (Owen hadn't even bothered to show up), promising that he'd call her, should anything of importance happen, and once again sat down to deal with the ever-growing piles of paperwork.

Tosh stayed in, too, using the lull in Rift activity to work on her brand new program that was supposed to forewarn them about said activities. It promised to be an uneventful afternoon… in Torchwood terms.

They had been working on their respective tasks for perhaps an hour when the landline in Jack's office rang. Ianto picked up the receiver with a quickly forming knot in his guts. _That_ phone was the official Torchwood line; the one that connected them to UNIT, to the PM's office, to the Home Office and other such places.

The time of reckoning had apparently come.

"Torchwood; Ianto Jones speaking," he said, barely able to hold the receiver in his suddenly nerveless fingers.

"This is Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart," the voice of an elderly man with a Scottish accent replied. "Please check your inbox, Mr Jones; there will be a very special invitation for you, coming from the highest places. I was asked to forewarn you so that you won't think this is someone's idea of a tasteless joke. Good day, Mr Jones."

And with that, the man hung up, not waiting for an answer.

"Who was it?" Tosh asked, alerted by the stony silence and Ianto's petrified expression.

"That," Ianto replied slowly, "was Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. Wanting to inform me that I'm about to receive mail from high above."

"_How_ high above?" Tosh gripped the armrests of her chair so hard her knuckles became bone white.

There could be no doubt now that Gwen had, in fact, contacted _somebody_ before they could have counteracted her efforts. The only remaining question was: whom.

"I don't know," Ianto said tonelessly. "But I reckon it should be in my mailbox by now."

"Then why don't you go and take a look?"

"Cos I'm scared, Tosh. For the first time since Lisa… since she got overpowered by her programming, I'm scared shitless. The Brigadier _is_ UNIT… or, at least, he used to be. What if they're indeed about to take over things here? What are we gonna do? No-one of us has a life outside of Torchwood!"

"Apart from Saint Gwen," Tosh commented cynically. "Well, _I_ won't have to worry about my future. If UNIT takes over, I'll be back in prison in no time."

"I wouldn't let them take you again," Ianto overcame his momentary panic; his face hardened. "I'll help you to leave the country, even if it's the last thing I can do before they move in. I still have means they don't know about; I'm the only one who can access the funds of Torchwood One abroad. It's my fault that I haven't stopped Gwen in time; I won't let _you_ suffer the consequences."

"You were in shock," Tosh said gently, deeply touched that he'd go such lengths to save her. No-one save for Jack had ever cared. "We all were."

"That's no excuse," Ianto replied blandly. "I'm the senior agent here; the last one from Headquarters. I should have acted right away."

"There's no use crying over spilled milk," Tosh sighed. "Well, are you going to check your mail or not?"

"I don't have much of a choice, do I?" Ianto opened his password-protected mailing program, clicked on the most recent message – and his jaw hit the floor.

"Nooo," he said, more shocked than Tosh had ever seen him. "No, this cannot be… This is simply not possible!"

Tosh ducked under his arm to see what had surprised him so much… and had a very similar reaction.

Because the message had come from the highest of places imaginable: directly from Buckingham Palace. Her Majesty, the Queen of England, ordered Ianto Jones, General Support Officer of Torchwood Three, to appear before her presence on the following Tuesday, at 10:00, with a colleague of his choice.

The letter contained the usual identification codes that proved that it had indeed come from the Palace. Acknowledgement of having received the message was also required.

"Now _this_," said Tosh, when they'd recovered from their shock and Ianto had clicked on the required link, "was unexpected. I didn't know that Jack had the Queen's personal e-mail address in that phone book of his."

"He didn't," Ianto printed out the message for the Archives – all communication with the Crown had to be recorded and filed away – and closed his mailing program again, just in case. "I doubt that she has one to begin with; and even if she does, no-one but her family would know it."

"Then how…" Tosh trailed off uncertainly.

"This is an official message, most likely sent by a trusted secretary," Ianto explained. "I recognize the header and the wording. Yvonne got such messages sometimes."

"But why would the Queen want to meet you?"

"I reckon Gwen contacted someone from the UNIT brass; perhaps the Brigadier himself, and they went straight to the Queen with the news that Jack's gone. She _is_ the one to whom Torchwood answers, after all."

Tosh nodded in understanding. "I see. Is this good for us or bad for us?"

"That's hard to tell," Ianto admitted. "Her Majesty has known Jack personally for many years; since her childhood, actually. So she would be reluctant to judge him before hearing _his_ version of the story. On the other hand, she might not be happy with _us_ for trying to keep this from her."

"So we're doomed, no matter what?"

"I really don't know. It's a fifty-fifty chance. She might give us her full support, since we're all that's left of Torchwood – or she might close us down, just as she closed Headquarters after Canary Wharf."

Tosh nodded thoughtfully. They weren't out of the woods due to this unexpected twist of events. Not by far.

"So, who will be the colleague of your choice?" she asked, making quotation marks in the air.

That would be a hard decision to make.

"Gwen," Ianto answered promptly.

"_Gwen_?" Tosh replied in surprise. "Are you sure about that? She'd do her best to discredit Torchwood in general and you in particular, just to prove how much her enlightened leadership is needed here."

"I know," Ianto sighed," and believe me, she's the last person I'd want to accompany me when I'm going to see the Queen. But what can I do? I can't leave her behind to watch the Rift of her own – Cardiff would be levelled and Wales taken over by aliens by the time I got back. Owen is useless at the moment; I can't count on him to watch the Rift, and I can't take him with me either. I'd love to take _you_; but the sad truth is, I need you here. Desperately. You're the only one I can trust."

"But Ianto, I can't take care of the Rift on my own!" Tosh protested, even though she was flattered by his trust.

Ianto nodded. "I know. That's why I'm going to see Detective Swanson. I think it's time to strengthen our ties with the police."

"Detective Swanson hates Torchwood," Tosh warned him.

Ianto smiled, albeit a little sadly. "No; she hated Jack's attitude and his rabid flirting. But she's a reasonable woman and a good cop. I meet her from time to time to control the damage done by our intrepid police liaison. She'll help us when she understands that we do what we do to protect the people of Cardiff."

"And how, exactly, are you planning to make her understand that?" Tosh asked doubtfully.

"By telling her the truth," was Ianto's simple answer.

Tosh shook her head. "That's too risky. What if she's resistant to Retcon, like Gwen was? If she runs into a trigger and starts to remember?"

Ianto rolled his eyes in exasperation. "Gwen _isn't_ resistant to Retcon. Jack messed up the dosage, and you know that. It's a moot point anyway, though, since I don't intend to Retcon Detective Swanson."

"You don't… you'd allow a _police officer_ to know what Torchwood is about, what we're doing here?" Tosh asked incredulously.

Ianto shrugged. "Why not? We're the worst-kept secret in Cardiff anyway, with a Torchwood logo on the SUV big enough to be seen from planetary orbit. I never understood the need for secrecy anyway. Unlike One, we're not testing alien tech or weapons here."

"Jack always said the public isn't ready to know about aliens yet."

"And he was probably right; although how can people live in a city infested with Weevils and not recognize them as aliens is beyond me. But I don't want to go public with _anything_. I just want an ally within the police who actually knows what we're doing and why and can help us cover up things if necessary. And I think Detective Swanson is the right woman for the job."

Tosh had to admit that Ianto was right. Detective Swanson was an intelligent, no-nonsense, down-to-Earth woman with a keen sense for justice and responsibility. She would understand the nature of their work; why it was confidential and why the need for cover stories. She'd sign the Official Secrets Act and keep her mouth shut about it. She also had a dry sense of humour, which could come in handy when dealing with Torchwood, with or without Jack.

Yes, she was an excellent choice. The fact that her coming aboard would piss Gwen off beyond measure was only an added bonus. If anyone could put her in her place, it was Detective Swanson… as it had been proved in the past, repeatedly.

Still Tosh wasn't entirely comfortable with the situation. Gwen was unpredictable at her best, and these weren't her best days, to put it mildly.

"I hope you know what you're doing, Ianto," was all she said.

"So do I," Ianto replied darkly. "Unfortunately, our choices are limited at best."

~TBC~


	7. Chapter 7: Negotiations

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Summary:** Jack is gone, and the rest of the Torchwood Three team must see how they manage without him.

* * *

**Chapter 07 – Negotiations**

About a week after her… _interesting_ interview with the journalist from the _Cardiff Gazette_, Detective Swanson found herself in the _Old Sailor_ with Ianto Jones, the head administrator of Torchwood Three. The fact that Jones was the _only_ administrator of Torchwood Three didn't make his job any less important – on the contrary. Swanson knew that the young man worked for three at the Torchwood base, and some days it showed, too.

This seemed to be one of those days.

Short meetings between them weren't a rare thing, actually. Swanson needed to co-ordinate her efforts with Torchwood sometimes, and the only Torchwood member she could speak with civilly and even reach some tentative agreements was Jones. Harkness behaved like the whole city would belong to him and Cooper… no, she wasn't about to even _think_ of Cooper's behaviour at crime scenes. The thought alone did bad things to her digestion.

She and Jones usually met in the _Little Mermaid_, as it was close to Roald Dahl Plass and the young man could slip out of their base for half an hour without catching the others' attention. Oh, Harkness knew; she was sure of that. But even Himself was reasonable enough not to insist on Swanson dealing with their 'official police liaison', knowing that it would never lead to anything good.

As she looked around in the _Old Sailor_, she got the impression that this meeting would be of much greater importance than the other ones. The old-fashioned pub had a couple of separated booths, where people could talk without being overheard, while the level of background noise efficiently rendered any potential listening devices useless. She had to give it to the young man: he certainly knew how to choose the right place for a confidential discussion.

Even though she was, technically, still on duty, she ordered a lager, instinctively feeling that she'd need it. Jones arrived at the same time as her drink, already bringing his own beer with him. Despite his impeccable three-piece suit, he didn't stand out of the mostly blue collar afternoon crowd. It must have been some extraordinary gift to blend in, Swanson decided.

"Do you ever wear anything else but suits?" she asked. "Outside work, for example, like other young men your age?"

Jones gave her a tired smile. "Last time I went anywhere without my armour I nearly got eaten by the cannibals of Brecon Beacons," he replied dryly. "Besides, I'm hardly ever off-work; and the Torchwood _I knew_ didn't exactly encourage casual Fridays."

"All right, now I'm confused," Swanson admitted freely. "What is this about, Jones? Why this place? What are you gonna tell me that clearly no-one else is supposed to learn about?"

Jones seemed to hesitate for a moment; then he nodded in appreciation.

"You're very perceptive, Detective Swanson. All right, I think it's time to lay the cards on the table. What I'm gonna tell you may never go any further, though. I fear I'll have to insist that you sign the Official Secrets Act right afterwards. But I decided, and Tosh agreed with me, that you need to learn the truth."

"It this about Harkness's disappearance?" at his shocked silence, she only shrugged. "I'm afraid it's not such a big secret any longer. Cooper babbled to her friends, one of which is married to a civil servant at the City Hall. Who, for his part, works with the husband of Cathy Salt, the science correspondent of the _Cardiff Gazette_. I heard it from her, during an interview about Cooper."

Jones gritted his teeth and muttered something in Welsh that wasn't suited to be repeated in decent company. For a moment, he was absolutely, coldly furious. Swanson found it interesting – and, to be honest, even mildly disturbing – how his fury only manifested in his eyes that turned to ice while his face remained carefully blank.

"Yes, it _is_ about Jack's disappearance; at least partially," he then said, after he'd put his controls back in place. "But mostly, it's about Torchwood; its story and its true purpose," he gave her one of his customary bland smiles and added. "Perhaps you'd like to get something to eat with your drink. This is gonna be a long story; and you might be hard-put to believe half of it. I know _I would_ if I were you."

* * *

About three hours later, now off duty and preparing to leave for home, Detective Swanson had to admit that _that_ had been an understatement. Her mind was still boggling from all the outrageous tales Jones had clearly accepted her to believe.

A Rift in space and time, right under Cardiff, spitting out aliens and alien technology and all sorts of weird stuff?

Aliens with faces like Halloween masks living in the sewers and attacking people randomly?

A nine-hundred-years-old alien guy, travelling through space and time at will in an old-fashioned police box, changing his looks and his personality when killed instead of dying like all decent people?

Jack Harkness, travelling with him and, as a result, unable to die… or rather to _remain_ death, for which reason he'd been with Torchwood Cardiff for a century and a half, never really changing?

The terrorist bombing at Canary Wharf actually a cover-up for the attempt of two different sorts of malevolent aliens to take over the planet?

It was all too fantastic, too much like bad science fiction to be taken seriously.

And yet, deep within, she _knew _it to be the truth. As one of the very few people with a natural resistance to whatever the government – or, as it seemed now, Torchwood – laced the water system with to make people forget, she remembered some things no-one else seemed to.

The monsters in the sewers. The terrifying, gleaming metallic robots marching down the streets, eliminating everything and everyone in their way. Strange deaths and sightings of creatures beyond human understanding from time to time. The whole business with Suzie Costello that nearly resulted in Gwen Cooper's death.

That 1950s airplane landing near Cardiff Bay – and then vanishing into thin air, just as mysteriously, a few days later. The illegal fighting club where men were fighting monsters to the death. Not to mention the most recent events that she was still trying to figure out for herself.

Yes, when she considered all those things, she began to see a pattern. A pattern that made her more inclined to believe Jones. She also remembered Andy Davidson's stories (also too fantastic to believe), whose aunt – or was that an uncle? – used to work for Torchwood Cardiff… until their boss, Harkness's predecessor, killed them all, including himself, back in 2000.

They all thought it had been sheer, dumb luck that Harkness survived. Now she understood it better. Either his crazed boss hadn't even tried to kill him, knowing he'd bounce back anyway, or he had been killed with the others… and bounced back, as always.

"Why are you telling me this?" she asked, not the least happy about being burdened with such knowledge.

"Because I've just been summoned to London… to Buckingham Palace, to be accurate, to give my report to the Queen herself," Jones explained grimly. "I'm not sure I'll be returning at all. And if I don't, Tosh will be in danger. There's no-one else I can entrust with her safety."

"But what could I possibly do?" Swanson asked in surprise. "I'm just a cop…"

"If I don't return, it means Torchwood will be dissolved and another organization – most likely UNIT – will take over," Jones explained. "They wouldn't want any of the team around, and they're beyond ruthless at dealing with unwanted people. I've already taken precautions to get Tosh out of the country in that case… but she'll have to reach her plane for that. So, if I don't call you on _this_ within the next four days," he slid a pre-paid phone across the table, "I ask you to put her into a police car, take her to the airport and see that she boards the plane for Japan. She's got citizenship; she'll be safe there – or as safe as it's humanly possible. Will you do this for me? For _her_?"

Swanson nodded. She'd only met the quiet little Japanese woman two or three times, but she found she liked her. Taking somebody to the airport was nothing illegal, either. She could do this.

"What about the others?" she asked. Jones shrugged.

"Honestly, I couldn't care less what becomes of Gwen, seeing that she brought us into this mess in the first place. If she, or anyone else, tries to tamper with our central computer or our security system, the base will self-destruct. Oh, don't worry," he added, seeing her alarmed look. "The base lies deep enough, and is well-shielded. The city won't be damaged in any way. The only things destroyed would be the Archives and the technology that shouldn't get into the wrong hands. Tosh and I saw to it."

"And your doctor?"

"Owen is on his way to drink himself into an early grave," Jones admitted glumly. "If I _do_ come back, I'll have to do something about it; make him get some help. At the moment, though, I can't do anything. And _what_ I'll be to do depends on whom Her Majesty will establish as our new boss. Right now, I'm simply the senior agent, which only entitles me to keep things running until the Crown decides about our fate."

"What if it's _you_ who gets assigned as the new Torchwood leader?" Swanson asked.

Jones gave her an alarmed look and a short, mirthless bark that almost counted as a laugh. _Almost_.

"That's highly unlikely. I've got seniority when it comes to service years, true; but I'm not boss material. Besides, I'm needed in the Archives. Desperately. Now that Jack's gone, I'm the only one with the necessary knowledge about them."

"Which may be the very reason why Her Majesty would want _you_ to call the shots in the future," pointed out Swanson logically.

Jones blanched. "God, I hope she won't! Keeping an eye on Owen and Gwen is bad enough as a temporary assignment. I wouldn't want to spend the rest of my life babysitting them. Even if life expectations aren't exactly long when you're working for Torchwood," he added cynically. "Unless you're Jack Harkness, your chances to live beyond your thirtieth birthday are extremely low."

"Still, I think it's better for you if you prepare yourself for the possibility," Swanson said. "Assuming you get to take over – what would be the first thing you'd do?"

"Hire more people," Jones replied without thinking, which revealed that he had indeed considered the possibility, despite being firmly in denial. "We've been ridiculously understaffed, ever since Jack took over. Even with him needing little to no sleep, things were chaotic. We need more field agents, we need more than one tech – he never actually replaced Suzie, and Tosh won't be able to do all the work by herself, not even with my help – we need at least one forensic scientist, and if Owen continues drinking himself into a stupor each night, we'll soon need a new doctor, too."

He shot Swanson a wry look and grinned. "Are you looking for a new job, Detective Swanson?"

"_Me_?" Swanson shook her head. "No, thanks. I'd like to see my daughter grow up if it's all right with you. But one from our SOCO-team has grown restless lately. She's got a PhD in biochemistry and a lesser degree in genetics; now that she'd worked off her student loans, she'd like to do some actual research. I think Torchwood would be right up her street. _And_ she's single, with no family to endanger – and currently no boyfriend to meddle. I think she'd fit in rather smoothly."

"Sounds promising," Jones allowed. "Who _is_ she?"

"Her name is Sara Lloyd… well, _Doctor_ Sara Lloyd, actually," Swanson replied. "I'm sure you've met her at various crime scenes; or at least the _others_ have, seeing that you don't actually show up at the crime scenes yourself."

Jones furrowed her brow. "Tall, blonde, in her early thirties, wears her hair in a ponytail? She was the lead SOCO officer during the Suzie incident, wasn't she? Made a very competent impression."

Swanson nodded. "That's her. But how can _you_ know her? You weren't even there."

"CCTV footage and photographic memory," Jones shrugged. "I'll leave a suggestion for whoever gets to be the next Torchwood Three leader. She sounds like an excellent choice. But when we're already at it, Detective Swanson, I'd like _you_ to be the new police liaison for Torchwood."

"I thought _Cooper_ was your police liaison," Swanson said in surprise.

"Oh yeah, and we both know how well _that_ worked," Jones snorted. "You and me have been the ones to stay in touch from the day on that I got hired by Jack, and Gwen blundering into the scene only served to alienate just about everyone at the police. Even more than _Jack_ did, which is quite the feat. Besides, what sense does it make to have a police liaison that isn't even with he police anymore?"

Swanson recognized a rhetorical question when she heard one, so she said nothing, allowing the young man to vent his annoyance a bit.

"Whoever takes over, they'll need somebody within the force, and you're the person best suited for the job," Jones continued. "I've got sufficient authority to make it official – _if_ you are willing, that is."

"It depends," Swanson said carefully. "Would it entail anything else than what I've already been doing?"

"Not on your side," Jones assured. "You'll simply be told more of what's _really_ going on, that's all. Not _everything_, though. _And_ you'll have to sign the Official Secrets Act, of course."

Swanson nodded slowly. That sounded reasonable. She really didn't want to know _everything._ Torchwood dealt with some really weird shit; and nightmares weren't the fun people sometimes made them sound like.

"I'm willing to give it a try," she said. "But if you want to make it official you have to go through Detective Inspector Henderson. He's a bit sensitive where the proper chain of command is concerned."

Jones nodded "I know. I've already written the official request but didn't want to send it before asking you, in case you wouldn't want it."

"I see you're about to build a brand new basis of support," Swanson commented. "You've been seen with that young man from the City Hall, Mr Grainger's PA, recently."

"Are you telling me that you keep an eye of us?" Jones asked with a grimace.

"Are you telling me that you didn't know it?" Swanson countered. "So, what about Mr Hopper? Is he one of your informants?"

Jones shook his head. "No, it's not like that. I went to school with Idris Hopper. We're old… well, saying _friends_ wouldn't quite be true, but we always went on well enough. Drifted apart a bit while I was in London, though. This is the first time we managed to catch up."

"A strange coincidence," Swanson commented, clearly not believing it.

"I never said it _was_ one," Jones answered with a bland smile. "I wasn't the one who suggested that particular meeting, though."

"So you're a man to inspire strong loyalties in others? Even after so many years? Impressive."

"And why would it be so surprising?" Jones said simply. "I'm a very loyal person myself. Just not always to the people _others_ expect me to be. I have made my fair share of horrible mistakes, though, so I don't believe myself infallible. Not even where my loyalties are concerned."

"No," Swanson said dryly. "_That_ was Harkness's number."

"It's easy to overestimate yourself when you're already large than life," Jones sighed. "Jack has his faults; quite a few of them, in fact. But the truth is, he won't be easily replaced. If I come back from London, I'll disclose a bit more about him to you – not the whole truth, of course, none of us can hope to know more than fragments, but enough for you to understand why he's been so important for Torchwood."

"And if you don't come back?" Swanson asked.

"Then it's safer for you to know as little as possible," Jones replied seriously. "In this case ignorance _is_ bliss. And with a stranger in charge, you won't need the knowledge, either."

"You're giving me the creeps, Jones," Swanson commented.

"Good," the young man said grimly. "You'll be safe enough as long as you remember that Torchwood is a very creepy place."

* * *

After having parted company with Detective Swanson, Ianto returned to the Hub, expecting to find Tosh still there. He was not disappointed.

"How did it go?" their resident genius asked when he descended via invisible lift.

"As well as it could be expected, I suppose," Ianto replied. "Detective Swanson is an intelligent woman, but there are several aspects outside our power that may be the making of us – or our ruin. There's simply no way to tell in advance. In any case, she agreed to take you safely to the airport, should I not contact her in due time. In Japan, with your family, you'll be reasonably safe."

"What about you, though?" Tosh asked in concern.

Ianto shrugged. "I've been on borrowed time since Canary Wharf. Twice so since that horrible mistake with Lisa. By right, I ought to be dead already. I don't really care. I do care about _you_, though; and not just cos Jack would want me to – although he would. You're a friend, and I don't have many of those left."

Tosh nodded in understanding and gratitude. Knowing that UNIT wouldn't get the chance to throw her back into that prison was a relief. Ianto was loyal to a fault, she knew that. The problems always started when two different kinds of loyalties clashed in his life.

Like in Lisa's case.

"I wish I could do something for _you_, though," she said.

"Actually, you can," Ianto replied. "Idris told me something about Jack helping to thwart Mayor Blaine's insane nuclear project. You were already here at that time, weren't you? Can you give me any details?"

Tosh nodded. "Sure. First of all, the Jack your friend was talking about wasn't _our_ Jack."

"_What_?" Ianto was more than a little taken aback by that statement.

"Well, you know he was travelling with the Doctor for a while," it wasn't really a question but Ianto nodded anyway. "Only that it wasn't the same Doctor you and I saw at Canary Wharf. It was the previous regeneration of the Doctor; the ninth one."

"Bloke with big ears and a big nose, wearing a black leather jacket all the time?" Ianto remembered the description given him by Idris.

Tosh nodded. "Yep. The same one _I was_ travelling with for two years. The same one Jack had been waiting for all the time, in fact."

"Then why didn't he go with him back in 2006 already?" Ianto asked, bewildered. Tosh sighed.

"It's not that simple. The Doctor who visited Cardiff back in 2006 – which, by the way, was the occasion when the perception filter of the lift was created, mainly by accident, I'd say – hadn't met Jack yet. In _his_ personal timeline, I mean."

"I don't understand," Ianto admitted unhappily.

He _hated_ not understanding things.

Tosh bit her lower lip. "All right, let's try a different approach. You know that time, by its very nature, isn't linear, right? That it's just the way _we_ experience it?" Ianto nodded. "There are races, the Time Lords above all, who can travel back and forth in time. That way, different timelines are created."

Ianto nodded again, signalling that so far he'd been able to follow. Tosh took a deep breath.

"Well, the Ninth Doctor – the one both Jack and I used to travel with – met _me_ at an earlier point of his personal timeline than Jack. Which is why I could never speak with him about Jack, even though at that point of _my_ personal timeline I'd already been working for Jack for a while; and in _his_ personal timeline, Jack had already been with Torchwood for a century and a half."

Ianto raised a hand. "Wait a minute. Are you telling me that while Jack's spent all this time in a linear way, working for Torchwood in Cardiff, another version of him visited Cardiff with the Doctor in 2006?"

Tosh nodded. "Exactly. He couldn't go with the Doctor at that time; he couldn't cross his own timeline. _That_ would have created a temporal paradox and that, according to the Doctor, isn't something you'd like to experience."

"Why not?"

"I'm not sure. Something about the Reapers, whatever they are… clearly some kind of Apocalypse could be the result. In any case, Jack, as a former Time Agent, knew that and put the Hub under lockdown, with anyone but me inside, to avoid the risk of running into himself. That would have been… complicated, seeing that his other self was young, carefree – and still _mortal_, with no idea what he'd become a short time later… relatively speaking."

"You met him as a mortal?" Ianto tried to conceal the envy in his voice – or was it jealousy?

Tosh shook her head. "No, I couldn't risk contaminating the timeline like that. I could meet the Doctor, though, as this was, for _him_, well after our shared adventures. He was travelling with Jack and that blonde bimbo at the time; the one who was also at Canary Wharf with his current regeneration."

"Rose Tyler," Ianto muttered. "The stupid git that _accidentally_ made him immortal, killing the previous Doctor in the process and replacing him with the cruel, self-centred prima donna who wouldn't move a finger to save all those people at Canary Wharf. As long as his blonde bimbo was safe, he couldn't care less for anyone else."

"Let's not discuss the Doctor's actions at Canary Wharf," Tosh said. "You know I'm not entirely happy about him, either, but that's nether here nor there right now. We're talking about the events in 2006. As you know, Mayor Blaine was, in fact, a Slitheen, who had specifically designed her Blaidd Drwg project to cause a nuclear meltdown, which would have opened the Rift and destroyed the whole planet, only to use the released Rift energy to escape to her homeworld with the help of a tribophysical waveform macrokinetic extrapolator…"

"A _what_?" Ianto's eyes started glazing over. "Tosh, you're losing me!"

"Erm… that was… think of it as some kind of pan-dimensional surfboard," Tosh explained. "In any case, Jack thought that the extrapolator would halve the time of the refuelling of the TARDIS and tried to install it…"

"The Doctor allowed Jack to fumble around the TARDIS?" Ianto was utterly surprised.

"Ianto, Jack's from the 51st century and from a different planet," Tosh remained him. "We can't even begin to understand what he's capable of when it comes to advanced alien tech. However, in this case he misjudged the situation; the extrapolator locked onto the power source of the TARDIS and tore open the Rift… and almost the planet itself with it. Had the Doctor not managed to close the TARDIS console and so reseal the Rift in time, we won't be having this conversation."

"Clearly, Jack knew why opening the Rift was such a bad idea," Ianto commented tiredly. "We should have listened to him."

"We should; but we were blinded," Tosh replied. "And besides, it's too late to ponder about that now. We made that mistake, lost Jack in the process, got him back for a short time; then he left with the Doctor, and now we have to live with the consequences."

"What happened to Mayor Blaine, though… I mean the Slitheen?" Ianto asked. "She seems to have vanished without a trace after the earthquake – that was the Rift opening, wasn't it?"

"Yeah; just like last time. The Slitheen was reverted to an egg by the light of the TARDis and the Doctor, Jack and Rose travelled to Raxacoricofallapatorius to deliver the egg, hoping that she'd use her second chance better. According to Jack, they wanted to take Rose's ex-boyfriend, Mickey Smith, with them, but he wouldn't join them until later."

"I never heard of a companion by the name of Mickey Smith," Ianto frowned.

"Oh, he only was with them for a very short time and chose to remain behind in an alternate dimension for a while," Tosh replied. "You do know him, though… just under a different name. Does Samuel, Rajesh Singh's assistant still ring a bell?"

"_Samuel_?" Ianto repeated in shock. "Samuel was actually a companion who managed to infiltrate Torchwood _London_? How on Earth was _that_ possible?"

"That's a long story," Tosh sighed. "He spent some time in that alternate dimension, fighting Cybermen; then he followed the 'ghosts' through the spatio-dimensional rift above Torchwood Tower to Earth. That's where he went back, together with Rose, when the doctor closed the rift after the Battle of Canary Wharf."

"Oookay," Ianto said slowly. "I'll need time to digest all this. Time I don't have at the moment."

"Right; you need to focus on what might be waiting for you in London," Tosh agreed, concern clearly written in her gentle face. "Especially from the side of your travelling companion. I'm still not sure this is a good idea, Ianto."

"And _I am_ pretty sure it's a really bad one," Ianto grimaced. "Unfortunately, I don't have any alternatives at the moment."

* * *

Gwen felt very smug when she learned that she would accompany Ianto in the Palace. Despite making himself appear undeservedly important, the teaboy clearly didn't dare to go to such an all-important meeting without her.

Things were looking more promising that she'd hoped for. Once in London, she'd find the chance to meet the right people – _without_ Ianto, of course – and explain them what had really been going on at Torchwood in the recent year. The authorities would understand then how necessary it was for Torchwood to be reorganized… and that under the right leadership.

Jack's guerrilla methods had been proven disastrous, several times over, and so had been his incompetence to keep the others in their reins. Of course, if one slept with the staff regularly and turned a blind eye on their misdeeds for sexual favours, one could not expect them to give their best, right?

If, as she hoped, she'd be promoted as the next Torchwood leader – and honestly, who _else_ could be? – there were going to be changes. Both in the methods and in the personnel.

Oh, she would keep Tosh, at least for a while. Tosh was very useful at what she was doing; and she was timid enough to obey when given a clear order. Granted, Jack _had_ spoiled her terribly, allowing her to work on her little pet projects on the sideline, but that would be easily changed. And she'd be _needed_; until an equally skilled tech could be found, that is.

As for Owen… Gwen shook her head in disappointment. Owen would have to go, as soon as possible. Not only was he rude and inconsiderate, he also neglected his job and did nothing but drink ever since that bitch Diane had left him.

Speaking of which; how was it responsible behaviour to sleep with someone who'd been just spat out by the Rift? Jack hadn't done so great, either, allowing poor John Ellis to commit suicide in Ianto's car, instead of helping him to fit in with 21st century society. At least she, Gwen, had done her best to help Emma adapt – and succeeded, hadn't she? Emma was no living in London and quite happy, working for some fashion house or another – Gwen really couldn't be bothered to remember the name.

No, Owen had to go. To rehab, most urgently; _Providence Park_ had a fairly good detox programme. Then he needed to be Retconned and set up in a new life somewhere. Yes, it _might_ be a risk to delete several years' worth of memories, but forgetting Torchwood _and_ Diane might even be therapeutic for him. And what if he _did_ end up as vegetable? In his current state he was barely more anyway.

That left Ianto to deal with, and Gwen was seriously concerned what to do about _him_. On the one hand, the Welshman was a threat that needed to be taken seriously. Gwen never really bothered herself with the Archives, but even she knew that they were choking full of potentially dangerous stuff, both info _and_ tech. Leaving all this in Ianto's hands would be disastrous; the incident with the Cyberwoman clearly showed how sneaky and ruthless the teaboy was.

On the other hand, he was the only one who really _knew_ the sodding Archives. He couldn't be safely removed without getting all the necessary codes and passwords out of him, and Gwen was realistic enough to know that Ianto would never give them _her _willingly. Fortunately, there were other ways to extract information – by force, if necessary. UNIT, or MI5, or any other of those shadowy organizations would know, eventually. They would have the tech, or the truth drugs, or whatever was needed.

Until then, Gwen would force herself to play nice with Jack's little bed-warmer. Come time, though, even Ianto would have to learn – one way or another – that offering his favours would no longer buy him any privileges. Unlike Jack, Gwen Cooper was not inclined to cradle robbery… and she couldn't be bought for sex.

Besides, it would only be a problem until the higher powers had found a trustworthy archivist for Torchwood Three. After _that_ Ianto, too, would be Retconned and removed, and Torchwood Three could start into a new era, under the competent leadership of Gwen Cooper.

~TBC~


	8. Chapter 8: Audiences

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Summary:** Jack is gone, and the rest of the Torchwood Three team must see how they manage without him.

**Author's note:** The _Julius Caesar_ is a really existing hotel. I actually stayed there during one of my London trips; the lift was indeed claustrophobia-inducing, and by the time it finally reached the 5th level, I was paralyzed with fear. *g*

Gwen's dress is the same one she wears in "Out of Time" when going to a disco with Emma and Rhys.

This story is not beta read. All mistakes are exclusively mine. :)

* * *

**Chapter 08 – Audiences**

To save resources, Ianto and Gwen took the train to London. Gwen pouted unhappily, but Ianto explained her with forced patience that while he did have the _means_ to access the resources of Torchwood One, he didn't have the _authority_ to do so; and he wouldn't find it ethical to plunder Jack's personal account, even though he could have done so. Hence the train trip which was much cheaper than going by car – not to mention by plane, which Gwen would have preferred.

Said trip was then surprisingly quiet. Gwen refused to talk to Ianto – which, frankly, was fine with him; he'd dreaded the possibility of having to listen to her inane chatter all the way to London.

Being reasonably familiar with London from his university years (and the ones spent at Headquarters), Ianto had booked them two single rooms in one of those cheap hotels scattered around Hyde Park that all had very nice bars and foyers but rather... rundown rooms on the upper levels.

Needless to say that Gwen wasn't very happy with their accommodations, either.

"One would think that Torchwood could afford better rooms for its employees on an official trip," she groused as the outdated lift of _Hotel Julius Caesar_ asthmatically wheezed up with them to the fifth level… which took approximately six or seven minutes.

"_Torchwood_ might," Ianto replied, unimpressed by her whining. "_We_ can't. This is _not_ a field trip, Gwen; we've been _summoned_ and will most likely be debriefed. It's gonna take time; I have no idea how long. I had to pick a hotel that we can afford, even if we have to stay in London for a week… or two."

"You mean that I'm going to pay for this fetid hole myself?" Gwen demanded in shocked disbelief.

Ianto shrugged. "So am I; and my salary is only marginally better than yours. Now, I suggest that you do whatever unpacking you need to do and refreshen a bit, cos somebody ought to come and fetch us for our audience in half an hour, sharp," he gave Gwen's street urchin outfit a pointed look. "Oh, and try to remember that we're about to make an appearance in the very heart of the British nation; do put on something more… proper, will you?"

Gwen's only answer was an angry scowl but Ianto couldn't care less whether she was affronted or not. He needed to refreshen himself after the train trip as much as she did, and neither of them had a lot of time to do so.

They were going to see the Queen. One had to look one's best at such a rare occasion.

* * *

Twenty minutes and thirty-five seconds later Ianto –wearing his sober, pin-striped charcoal grey three-piece suit that, fortunately, survived the train trip in an impeccable state, and aubergine button down shirt, a self-patterned bronze tie and his better pair of dress shoes – left his hotel room again. He was perfectly groomed, every single hair on his head firmly in place, smelled faintly of sandalwood aftershave and carried a black leather briefcase secured with a combination lock.

He took a deep breath and knocked on Gwen's door with mild anxiety, not quite knowing what to expect.

"Gwen, are you ready? We'll be picked up in ten."

In the next moment the door was thrown open in a dramatic gesture, and Gwen stood in the doorframe, wearing her own version of the classic little black dress … a fairly form-hugging and low-cut one.

"Well?" she demanded. "Proper enough for you?"

"Sixty per cent less cleavage would be preferable, but it will do," Ianto replied dryly. "Let's go; I'm sure we're already expected in the foyer."

They rode the asthmatic lift down to the grown level and entered the foyer right on time – to the visible relief of a tall, dark-haired man in an expensive suit who stood out of the crowd (consisting of small-budget tourists, mostly) like a sore thumb. Even Gwen, not the most observant person on the planet, spotted him at once.

"That's him?" she asked softly, her eyes widening with the realization that things were about to get very serious, very soon. "Do you think he's an agent of the Secret Service or somesuch?"

"Hardly," Ianto snorted. "Firstly, he's unarmed; no holster under his suit jacket. Secondly, the suit he's wearing is a custom-made one; at least Ł700. His nails are manicured and his forehead is permanently wrinkled. I'd say he's a posh officer worker serving in the Palace, with a small dog… no, two small dogs…well, three, actually."

"You're making this up!" Gwen said accusingly.

Ianto shook his head and smiled.

"No, I'm not. Look at his shoes: he's clearly an indoor worker. A right-handed one, judging by the way his hands are folded in front of him. "

"So, you're Sherlock Holmes now?" Gwen's voice was dripping with sarcasm.

"Not at all," Ianto took no offence; he was used to her belittling him in most things. "It's simple observation. We were all trained in such things at One."

"If you say so," Gwen allowed doubtfully. "But what about the dogs?"

"Wiry hairs on the cuff of his trouser leg," Ianto pointed out. "A few hairs of different colour higher up the same trouser leg. And more hairs on the other trouser leg. Quite simple, really."

Without waiting an answer from Gwen, he crossed the foyer, addressing the man in question directly. "Excuse me, sir; I believe you're looking for me. My name is Jones. Ianto Jones, from Torchwood Cardiff."

"Plummer," the man shook his hand in obvious relief. "I am to take you to the Palace, Mr Jones. You and your colleague, Ms…?"

"Gwen Cooper," Gwen said hurriedly before Ianto could have and gave the man her most winning smile. "Nice to meet you, Mr Plummer."

Ianto rolled his eyes, cos Plummer was clearly not much more than an errand-runner and therefore not worth wasting any charm on him, but he was not about to tell Gwen _that_.

She wouldn't listen to him anyway. She never did.

* * *

Mr Plummer led them out of the hotel to a sleek black car that was parking nearby, driven by a gorilla in a suit. Figuratively speaking. The expensive leather upholstery alone was more worth than the entire shoebox Ianto called his flat, but he did his best to remain unimpressed.

Gwen, on the other hand, made no secret of her delight about being treated in such a posh manner. A girl was allowed to enjoy her creature comforts, after all.

The gorilla behind the steering wheel had clearly been trained well. They reached the Palace in record time and entered it through a side door via internal lift directly from the garage. They went along various corridors before being shown into an enormous, ornate hall with massive crystal chandeliers hanging from the ceiling and the walls covered in gold brocade wallpaper – or was that actual fabric?

Gwen couldn't help but stop for a moment to admire the beauty of the sight, cos it was _Buckingham Palace_, and just how often did a girl get to see _that_? How could Ianto still remain blank-faced in this place? Had the teaboy no understanding of the grandeur of the moment?

To her regret, she couldn't enjoy the view for too long. Mr Plummer was already getting impatient, gesturing them towards a nearby room – clearly the one in which they were expected. With a disappointed sigh, she followed Ianto. Mr Plummer waited for them to enter – and then walked away.

It was clearly a small audience room; one designed for more… relaxed interviews or personal meetings. Aside from the beautiful mantelpiece – a piece of art in white marble in itself – the furniture consisted of a small, round table with a sofa on either side of it; nineteenth century handiwork, all there of them.

On the left-hand sofa was sitting an elderly gentleman with a strong chin, wavy iron-grey hair and dramatic sideburns. Despite the fact that he was wearing civilian clothes, his entire demeanour all but screamed military. Navy, if the sideburns were any indication. He was well into his 60s, but still ruggedly handsome and highly alert. Ianto easily recognized him as Commodore Sullivan, since he had visited Torchwood London repeatedly.

Another elderly gentleman was standing at the mantelpiece ramrod straight, not leaning against at it at all. Ianto had never seen him in person, but even filled out considerably and white-haired, Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart was quite an unmistakable figure. A quick observation categorized him as a dog-lover, a horse-ride, a non-smoker and a tea drinker; most likely an early riser, too, which wasn't really surprising from somebody who spent his entire life in the military.

The third man in the room was a lot younger, probably in his mid-40s, with a round, friendly face and watery blue eyes. He was also wearing a kilt.

"Sir Archibald!" Ianto exclaimed in relief. "I didn't expect _you_ to be here, to be honest."

Sir Archibald McAllister – or, as Jack liked to call him, Archie from Torchwood Two – shrugged.

"Where else shouldae be, laddie? We _are_ Torchwood; and whatever is happenin' to you, it's goin' t'have an effect on _my_ life, too."

"The Queen and Prince William will be joining us in a few minutes," Commodore Sullivan added. "I assume you've been properly trained where the protocol about making the royal family is concerned, Mr. Jones?"

Ianto nodded. "Yes, sir. Ms Hartman was very much concerned about proper behaviour where important visitors were concerned."

"Rather unlike Jack, I'd assume," the commodore grinned. "Which means that your… _associate_ probably has no idea how to behave in the Palace."

"It's not her fault, sir," Ianto replied, valiantly withstanding the temptation to add _this time_ while Gwen was fuming, of course. "Jack had a rather… relaxed attitude towards protocol."

"Well, he could afford it," Sir Archibald commented with a snort.

"You two, on the other hand, cannot," the commodore continued; then he looked directly at Gwen, her friendly eyes hardening just a little.

"Nice to meet you in person, Miss Cooper. Your message to me was… educational, I'd say. Now allow me to return the favour and provide you with a bit of education in exchange. You are about to meet Her Majesty, the Queen of England; this is a privilege and an honour few people can call their own. Should it ever happen to you again, I strongly advise you to dress more decently. This is Buckingham Palace, in case you haven't realized yet, not a 1990s disco. Also: the Queen may or may not as _you_ any questions, seeing that she has primarily summoned Mr Jones. If she does, you'll address her as Your Majesty or Ma'am. Prince William is addressed properly as Your Highness. Do you understand?"

Gwen was torn between righteous indignation and shock. She had not expected to meet Commodore Sullivan with Ianto present – the plan had been to seek out the man in private and talk to him under four eyes. And she did not appreciate the old mans unasked-for lecture about proper dressing. She _did_ know how to dress properly, thank you very much. She used to work in a fashion boutique, after all, and they weren't living in the 19th century anymore.

"Good," the commodore said, not waiting for a formal answer.

* * *

There wasn't time for one either, as a side door opened and in walked the Queen herself, wearing a knee-length primrose dress, accompanied by her oldest grandson. Prince William was wearing a steel-grey bespoke suit in which he looked very handsome indeed.

But that wasn't what surprised Gwen most.

"He… he looks just like Banana Boat!" she blurted out; unfortunately, loud enough for the royals to overhear.

As little flattering as it was the future heir of Britain's throne to be compared with Rhys's notorious womanizer, often stone drunk best mate, now that he'd seen the prince in the flesh, Ianto had to admit that there _was_ a marked resemblance between the two. Of course that didn't make the situation less embarrassing His ears were burning and he knew they must be bright red.

Prince William noticed Ianto's discomfort and made an amenable effort to dissolve the tension in the room.

"I gather that wasn't a particularly flattering noting," he said with a friendly grin.

Ianto assumed this had to be the way he behaved among his fellow airmen to put them at ease about serving with royalty.

"No, Your Highness," he replied flatly. "I'd say it was a notion born of ignorance and best forgotten."

Gwen just opened her mouth to tell Ianto off but the Commodore intervened smoothly before she could have put her foot in again.

"Ma'am, if I may introduce Mr Ianto Jones, formerly a junior archivist of Torchwood London, now general support officer and senior agent of Torchwood Cardiff – and Miss Cooper, the newest member of the Cardiff branch."

Gwen didn't like at all that her rookie status had been so expressly emphasized but found it better to remain silent for the time being. One _faux pas_ per moment was more than enough, even for her.

"Thank you, Commodore," the Queen said, her face unreadable, while that of Prince William showed only polite interest. "Please have a seat, all of you. We have important things to discuss and little time to do so."

When they had all found a seat and tea had been served, the Queen looked directly at Ianto and said without preamble:

"Mr Jones, I am too old and have too many obligations to beat around the bush, so I expect direct and truthful answers from you. Is it true that Captain Harkness left with the Doctor, without leaving any orders concerning his temporary replacement _or_ his succession?"

"Yes, Ma'am," Ianto replied simply.

"And you tried to keep that fact concealed from the authorities, is that also correct?" the Queen continued.

Ianto shot Gwen a side glance that could have frozen Hell over but answered truthfully. "_Tried_ us the key word, Ma'am."

"Why would you want to do so?"

"Two reasons, Ma'am. Firstly, we couldn't know if Jack… if Captain Harkness planned to come back any time soon. I wanted to give him a chance to do so before I'd sound the alarm."

The Queen nodded. "That, at least, sounds plausible. What was the other reason?"

Ianto glanced briefly at the Brigadier and Commodore Sullivan before answering to _that_.

"No offence to the worthy gentlemen present, ma'am, but I didn't want UNIT to move in and take over everything. The Rift is… special. It needs special care. I do not believe UNIT would be able to provide that care. They are a bit too trigger-happy to deal with the Rift properly."

"But _you_ would be able to do so?" Prince William asked, clearly not convinced. "You're younger than I am. What makes you think you can take over such responsibility."

"I can't; not on my own, at least," Ianto agreed. "I'm and archivist, not a field agent, and we'd definitely need more people, a bigger team, now that Jack… that Captain Harkness is gone for who knows how long. I'm afraid it won't be easy to find a replacement for him – if that is Her Majesty's intention," he added with a respectful nod in the Queen's direction. "But the Rift has been in Torchwood's care since the 19th century, and I firmly believe that Torchwood is best suited to watch it. Our outpost has been built for this very purpose, after all."

"We wouldn't have a problem to begin with if Jack hadn't run off into the blue, abandoning us _and_ his duty," Gwen muttered angrily. "If he really was such a saint as you're trying to colour him now why did you help us to open the Rift against his orders, just a couple of weeks ago?"

Ianto closed his eyes in despair. Trust Gwen to blurt out the biggest, most horrible mistake Torchwood Three had made since 1 January 2000, when its leader had massacred the entire team to save them from some nebulous future terror – well, save for Jack, of course.

"I was misled like the rest of us," he answered with forced patience. "It was a fatal mistake, I know that now. And I know that no amount of regret will make those one hundred and thirty-eight people who died as a result alive again. But at least _I wasn't_ the one who shot Jack dead, so that we could get his retina print by force."

"No; _that_ was Owen," Gwen shot back.

Ianto rolled his eyes. "And whose idea was it to go against Jack's orders in the first place?"

"Wait!" the Brigadier interrupted before Gwen could have answered. "That most recent earthquake in Cardiff, all those deaths… it was the result of the Rift opening?"

"Yes, sir," Ianto admitted tonelessly. "It was all our doing. We were made to believe that opening the Rift fully would put an end to other realities leaking through. We were wrong. Jack knew it, he warned us that we'd only make everything worse, but we weren't listening."

"And why was nobody informed about those facts?" the Brigadier demanded angrily.

"Actually," Sir Archibald coughed, "_I was_. Mr Jones sent me a detailed report of those events, openly admittin' his own role in the disaster. A copy o' his report has been also sent to Torchwood House for archivin'. Seein' as Torchwood House doesnae have a custodian at the moment, though…"

"You made a _report_?" Gwen hissed at Ianto. "And you sent it to _him_, without the rest of us knowing it?"

"I do not answer to you, Gwen," Ianto replied tiredly. "If you'd made an effort to study proper Torchwood protocol, however, you'd know that in the current situation I do answer to Sir Archibald. He's the only Torchwood leader left, even if the Glasgow branch consists only of him at the moment. As the archivist of Torchwood Three, I'm obliged to inform he other Torchwood leaders when ours isn't available."

"Oh, don't get all prim and proper on me, Teaboy!" Gwen spat. "You weren't such a stickler to the rules when you were hiding that blasted Cyberwoman in our very basement."

In the deafening silence she whirled around to glare at Sir Archibald accusingly. "Or has he sent you a report about _that_, too?"

"Nay, lass," the Torchwood Two leader answered calmly. "He told me everythin' in person when he came over to reorganize our archives, which, admittedly were in a shambles. Offered me to file a full confession and send a copy to Torchwood House as well."

"Yet you refused the offer, obviously," the Queen said. "May I ask why?"

Sir Archibald nodded. "Aye Ma'am that I did. Jack clearly wanted t' give the lad a second chance and I didnae want to be an obstacle; trusted Jack t' know what he was doin'."

"I see," the Queen turned to Ianto. "Would you care to tell us, Mr Jones, why did you take such an unreasonable risk? You _were_ at Canary Wharf; one of the very few people who survived the battle. You know what those… creatures were capable of."

"The Cyberman in question used to be my fiancée," Ianto confessed tonelessly. "Her conversion was not complete. I hoped to find a way to reverse it and save her. I even consulted Dr. Tanizaki, one of Earth's lead cybernetics experts, and he made me hope."

"A fat lot of good did it do him," Gwen commented.

"We were told on good authority that such a thing is not possible," the Queen looked at the Commodore. "Have we been misinformed? You were there; saw the aftermath of that battle. Was there truly any hope to save those people?"

Sullivan shook his head. "As a rule, the conversion is irreversible. However, thee had been random moments when somebody with strong enough willpower retained their personality, even after full conversion. We know for a fact that Yvonne Hartman did – at least long enough to create a diversion and such enable the doctor to get through with his plan and save us all. Of course, this doesn't mean that she wouldn't have been overwhelmed by the Cyber-programming eventually. Still, without her strength we may not be having this conversation right now."

"You mean he was _right_ to keep a Cyberwoman in our basement?" Gwen stared at the commodore in furious disbelief. "That… that… _thing _killed two people, _I_ nearly got converted, Jack covered up his shit because he was shagging him, and you say he was _right_?"

"No," Sullivan replied flatly. "I say that it was a horrible but understandable mistake, and Captain Harkness clearly was of the same opinion. You, Miss Cooper, should remember in whose presence you are, though, and try to change your wording accordingly."

Gwen opened and closed her mouth several times in impotent fury, making a very convincing impression of a traumatised goldfish. The fact that the very man she'd contacted to reveal to him the unforgivable lashness and favouritism of Jack's failed leadership would torn on her and support _Ianto_ was beyond her understanding.

Were they all insane? Couldn't they see that Ianto had endangered, Torchwood Three from the very day on he shagged himself into Jack's good graces, almost get them all killed, not just that crazy old scientist and that poor pizza girl, nearly got _her_ converted – and Jack let him get away with it all? Just because of his willing arse?

And that Archie bloke from Glasgow, he'd known it all the time and did _nothing_? She shook her head in shocked disbelief but unfortunately, no-one paid her any attention. They all seemed to be focused on Ianto instead; as if they hadn't realised what a lying little bitch he was.

_Jack's lying little bitch_, a cruel little inner voice mocked her. She suppressed it ruthlessly.

"Mr Jones," the Queen said with quiet authority. "You told us repeatedly that Torchwood is best suited to watch the Rift. You will understand, I presume, that in the light of what we have just learned we have difficulties to believe that."

"I understand that, Ma'am," Ianto replied, guilt clearly written in his young face. "However, I still firmly believe that the Rift is Torchwood's responsibility and should remain that."

"A responsibility you and the others haven't dealt with too well," Prince William pointed out, not unkindly but consequently. "You've gone so far as to kill your leader who tried to sop you making a grievous error of judgement. Can you guarantee us that it would not happen again?"

"No, your Highness, I'm afraid I cannot," Ianto admitted. "I do hope, though, that we've learned from our mistake; at least most of us have," he added, studiously _not_ looking in Gwen's direction.

There was no need for that. His point had clearly been made already.

A long silence followed, and then the Queen exchanged meaningful looks with her grandson.

"Prince William and I need to discuss this in private," she then said. "Please wait for us here. Sir Archibald, you will join us; we might need additional data and you seem to be in possession of such data."

"What about us?" the Brigadier asked.

"Your opinions are known to us already, Sir Alistair. Please remain here with our guests."

The old soldier snapped to attention automatically. "Yes, Ma'am!" he replied crisply.

* * *

As soon as they were left alone – well, save for the presence of Commodore Sullivan and the Brigadier – Ianto whirled around and glared daggers at Gwen.

"What the hell was _that_ suppose to mean?" he snarled. "Do you want to get Torchwood closed? 'Cos if that was the plan, you've done a bloody good job of it. You might even get your wish yet."

Gwen stared back at him in shock. "How can you say that, Ianto? I only tried to _save_ Torchwood!"

"I say, you have a strange way to show it, Miss," the commodore commented dryly.

Gwen ignored him. She had hoped to find an ally in him but he'd turned out as another one of Jack's sycophants, therefore he no longer counted. She had to deal with Ianto right now.

"You must admit that things can't continue the way they were handled under Jack's leadership," she argued. "He never told us anything, there was no discipline, everyone could do what they wanted."

"Look who's speaking," Ianto said with biting irony. "If memory serves me well, _you_ were the one who violated every single rule. _You_ blurted out things to Andy _and_ Rhys, and then took Retcon without asking or getting permission to make them forget."

Gwen tried to interrupt him but Ianto was on the roll and couldn't be stopped. All the things that had ever annoyed him about Gwen came to the surface and wanted out.

"_You_ were the one who came to work whenever you wanted and couldn't be bothered to do your own paperwork," he continued mercilessly. "_You_ were the one who ignored Jack's orders all the time 'cos you were so sure that you know it better than him who'd been doing this job for a century and a half, endangering the whole team _and_ innocent bystanders in the process."

"I never," Gwen protested but Ianto steamrolled him in a manner that would have made Jack proud.

"_You_ were the one who instigated the whole rebellion against Jack, declaring that you'd end the world happily only to get Rhys back – and then you ignored him for days, sitting in the morgue with Jack's body. _You_ were the one who did your best to get into Jack's pants while flinging your oh-so-happy relationship in the face of us poor, lonely losers; never mind the fact that you were fucking Owen on the side."

He paused expectantly but Gwen was momentarily unable to even think up a retort, much less to voice it.

"No comments?" Ianto taunted her. "Well, good. What bothered us most was that Jack let you get away with everything, for reasons none of us could fully understand. Under any other Torchwood leader you'd have been fired and Retconned back to your diapers after the first week; so don't you _are_ to say anything against Jack's leadership!"

Such a vicious outburst from the always quiet, mild-mannered teaboy surprised and angered Gwen very much. How did he _dare_, the filthy little traitor, to speak to her like that? Wasn't it him who nearly got them all killed? And got away unpunished by offering up his arse to Jack? Didn't he know that he'd been merely a substitute – a part-time shag as Owen always said – just because Jack had been so unreasonably considerate towards Rhys?

She opened her mouth to launch into a lengthy tirade but the commodore cut her in the word before she could have started.

"Be quiet, Miss Cooper. You've already betrayed your colleagues by sending a report behind their backs to the very authorities they _didn't_ want to inform about the disappearance of Captain Harkness, for reasons that I find sound, now that they have been explained. Fortunately, your mean-spirited little epistle landed on _my_ desk; otherwise the consequences could have been… dire. For you as well as for them. Or are you naïve enough to believe that _you_ would have got away unscathed once they'd shut Torchwood Three down? You, the rookie, the newest, least experienced team member? Oh, please!"

Before Gwen could answer – not that she could have thought of any coherent answer at the moment – the side door opened again and the Queen returned.

~TBC~


	9. Chapter 9: The Queen's Justice

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Summary:** Jack is gone, and the rest of the Torchwood Three team must see how they manage without him.

**Author's note:** The details of Prince William's military career are genuine, as far as one can believe Wikipedia. I've just moved some events a bit in time to fit this story.

The Queen's reasoning for her choice as the new Torchwood director was suggested by weis07. Owen's problems have been summarised by dr_doomsduck a few years ago. I only rephrased them to fit the dialogue better. Thanks for your contribution, ladies!

This story is not beta read. All mistakes belong exclusively to me. *g*

* * *

**Chapter 09 – The Queen's Justice**

"Please, sit," she said in her usual controlled manner. "We have discussed the problem – with the valuable contribution of Sir Archibald – and have come to the conclusion that Torchwood must remain in control of the Rift."

Ianto closed his eyes, dizzy with relief. He didn't really care whom Her Majesty would appoint as the new Torchwood Three leader. He didn't care if he personally would be punished or not. What counted was that UNIT wouldn't move in and take over. Tosh would be safe. Jack's work, faulty though it might have been in some places, would prevail.

"However," the Queen continued sternly, "there will have to be definitive changes in the ways how Torchwood has been led until now. And for that reason we decided to appoint Mr Jones as the new Torchwood director – not only as the leader of the Cardiff branch but as the head of the entire organization… what is still left of it."

It was a rare thing that Ianto would lose his composition. _This_ was one of those rare times.

"Me, Ma'am?" he stuttered. "But… but I'm an archivist, not a field agent! And I'm too young for such responsibility. Surely, Sir Archibald…"

"Sir Archibald has his own duties, of which you no doubt are well aware," the Queen interrupted him in a tone that brooked no argument. "And Torchwood Tow, as you all know, is but an office in Glasgow. Torchwood Three is the only still functional branch, and you're the only surviving archivist of Headquarters. The only one who knows the codes and passwords to access the legacy of Torchwood One. You may not be a field agent, but like all Torchwood One members, you _have_ been trained for field work if needs must be; including weapons training. And you have the administrative power. You may not be the best chance, true; but right now, you are the _only _chance."

At this point Gwen couldn't remain silent any longer.

"But Your Highness, you can't seriously consider making _him_ the leader of Torchwood!" she protested.

The Commodore flinched. Despite wearing an Irish name, he was English to the bones and took such glitches in protocol very seriously.

"The correct way to address the Queen is _Your Majesty_," he said through gritted teeth. "I've already told you that."

The Queen waved dismissively.

"Let it be, Commodore. We cannot expect a person like her to remain conscious of the protocol," she then turned to Gwen. "We do not appreciate your efforts to make Captain Harkness responsible for everything that went wrong with Torchwood lately. We know what he is like and what he has done fro Crown and country in the last two centuries. Your slander has not changed our opinion about him."

She turned back to Ianto. "Captain Harkness saved my life; I am sure you can find the details somewhere in your archives. You and your colleagues failed him – this is your chance to make amends. I will make you step in his shoes. I think this is punishment enough; a more severe one than anything else I could inflict upon you, Mr Jones. You weren't loyal enough to your captain; although, as one trained at Headquarters, you should have known better. I hope in the upcoming days you won't be so foolish."

"No, Ma'am," Ianto murmured.

"We have decided that Torchwood has to be standing," the Queen declared. "Captain Harkness deemed you worthy a second chance. We are not about to dispute his decision. And while Captain Harkness is not here, you _will_ step in his stead and serve your Queen and country. For his sake, Mr Jones. Are you ready?"

Ianto sighed dejectedly. There was really just one answer he could give and they both knew it.

"Yes, Ma'am," he said in defeat.

This was not what he wanted; what he'd _ever_ wanted. This was not what he'd been trained for. But if this was the price to pay to save Torchwood – to save Tosh and the clueless people of Cardiff, sitting atop the Rift – he was willing to pay it. _Someone_ had to; and at least this would give him purpose again.

He made a mental note to thank Detective Swanson for preparing him for this possibility. He didn't understand why Sir Archibald was beaming at him with such fatherly pride. He felt woefully unfit for the role. But he would do his best, as always. He had no other choice, had he?

"Very well," the Queen said with an almost-smile, giving him the absurd feeling that he had somehow met her expectations. "We do not want to leave you without support in this difficult situation, though. That is why we shall appoint a new liaison between Torchwood and the Crown," she looked at her grandson expectantly.

Prince William nodded. "I'll be training with the Navy for two months, from June to August, but after that I'm going to transfer my commission to the Search and Rescue Training Unit at RAF Valley on Anglesey, to be trained as a helicopter pilot with the Royal Air Force's Search and Rescue Force. That means I will be living in Wales for the next couple of years, which will come in very handy. Until then you can contact my private office here in the Palace, should you need any help. My advisor, Sir David Manning, will be happy to support you if necessary."

"Thank you, Your Highness," breathing felt slightly easier now, Ianto found. With a royal supporter strengthening his position, he might actually be able to hold his own against UNIT – and even against Defence Minister Saxon who didn't seem to like Torchwood very much.

"However," the prince continued, grinning excitedly like a kid, expecting a visit in his favourite candy shop, "before I'd have to leave for the royal Naval College, I want to be given the grand tour of that Batcave of yours."

For the first time since he'd been summoned to the Palace, Ianto could actually smile freely.

"I reckon that can be arranged, Your Highness," his smile widened a millimetre or two as he thought about the logistics of smuggling the prince into the Hub. "We can always pretend that we've invited Banana Boat for a visit, can't we, Gwen?"

Gwen's only answer was a murderous glare. Prince William laughed.

"I can live with that. It won't be worse than being called Billy the Fish, as my fellow airmen used to do to keep the paparazzi off my scent. I'll have you contacted to work out the details as soon as your other affairs in London have been taken care of."

"My… other affairs?" Ianto repeated in vague suspicion.

"You've said yourself that you'd need a bigger team," the commodore interfered, "and we happen to agree. Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart and my humble self have looked up a few possible candidates and arranged a meeting with them for tomorrow, so that you can evaluate and eventually debrief them."

"Anyone I might know?" Ianto asked, assuming – correctly, as it would later show – that they had sought out some survivors from Torchwood One.

"Some of them," the commodore replied. "Others, the Brigadier and I know and can suggest with good conscience. You'll meet them in Prince William's private office, as His Highness wants to be present at the meeting."

"I hope you don't mind," the Prince added. "I must admit that I'm curious to see how such things work and what the requirements to become a Torchwood member are."

"You are quite welcome to join us of course, Your Highness," Ianto replied politely.

Not that he could have refused the request. In fact, the prince didn't need to ask in the first place, now that he had been officially appointed by the Queen to oversee Torchwood's activities. But Ianto really didn't mind his presence; on the contrary. The request showed an honest interest from the prince's side; and frankly, having somebody of his own age watching his back, somebody powerful and influential and generally liked was a relief.

"Very well," the Queen rose and all followed suit respectfully. "I am certain that you can discuss any further details among yourselves, gentlemen. We have other duties to attend to. Good day, Mr Jones; do not make us regret our decision."

"I will do my best, Ma'am," Ianto promised, and he meant it. He _would_ do his utmost to prove himself worthy of her trust.

"That is all we can ask," the Queen said with a small, satisfied nod. "Come on, William. Our next appointment awaits."

* * *

Barely had the royals left when Sir Archibald turned to Ianto.

"Mind ya, laddie, I wannae sit in on that meeting meself. It's yer business whom ya hire, naturally, but I wouldae like to know whom I'll be goin' to work with in the future."

"You're welcome to join us, Sir Archibald," Ianto replied. "In fact, I'd appreciate every input from you. I'm not exactly boss material, I'm afraid."

Sir Archibald laughed. "And ya think _I am_? D'ya know what Yvonne used to call me? 'That madman from Glasgow', that's how."

"Still better than 'the Freak of Cardiff', as she liked to call Jack," Ianto answered dryly. "I never understood why the two hated each other so much. Yvonne wasn't so bad, actually; certainly not the monster as UNIT likes to present her, now that she can't defend herself. Yes, she was determined, ruthless even in pursuing her goals, but isn't that what's expected from every corporate manager? Why they're being hired to begin with?"

The Brigadier harrumphed unhappily.

"She played a dangerous game with all that alien technology at her disposal, without understanding the risks," he said. "And we all know how it ended, don't we?"

"There are dangerous experiments running in secret labs all over the globe," Ianto returned sharply. "Some of them are run by UNIT personnel. Every single one of them could end in a spectacular disaster at any given moment. And let me tell you something, sir: my colleagues at One knew what they were doing. Torchwood only recruited from the best and the brightest."

"One has to wonder what _you_ have been hired for then," Gwen said nastily. "For your coffee or for your willingness to spread 'em for the boss."

"For my photographic memory, actually, although I seriously doubt that you know what _that_ is," Ianto replied, completely unfazed by her allusions. "I think someone who lives in a glass house shouldn't throw rocks, Gwen. You've been willing enough to spread 'em for Jack, from the moment you entered the Hub for the first time, despite the fact that you have that good-natured, long-suffering fool at home who worships the earth you walk on. It's not your doing that Jack never really wanted you. Not after the first wave of lust he felt for practically everyone."

"How do you _dare_…" Gwen was already raising her hand to slap him across the face but Ianto caught her wrist and held it effortlessly.

"Like it or not, Gwen, I'm officially your boss now, and I speak to you as I see fit. Be grateful that I'm not inclined to pretty vengeance, seeing the way you treated both me and Tosh in the previous year. I am willing to overlook that as a sign of your ignorance and because Jack was certainly giving you the wrong impression that you're entitled to order us around as you please, but that will stop, here and now."

"Or what?" Gwen snapped. Ianto's eyes became ice cold.

"Or, so God help me, I'll Retcon you so far back you won't even be able to drool into your bib without help. Don't try my patience, Gwen. I'm not Jack, I won't put up with your shit any longer."

"You know that Retcon won't work on me," Gwen reminded him smugly. "Jack's already tried it; and failed."

"Jack messed up the dosage because he had the hots for you; perhaps you reminded him of some bug-eyed alien squid he had kinky tentacle sex with on another planet," Ianto returned, getting a bit nasty himself.

He couldn't help it. Gwen always brought out the worst of him, and the fact that he finally could put her in her place, after having to endure her callous, bossy manner for over a year, was too bloody tempting.

"I won't make the same mistake, so I suggest that you be quiet and think about your future very, _very_ carefully," he added warningly.

"This isn't over yet, Teaboy," Gwen was already too furious to watch her tongue. Otherwise she might have realised that calling names at her boss when said boss was already royally pissed at her wasn't the best idea.

"On the contrary," Ianto replied icily. "I'm done and over with you and your attitude. This is your last warning. Screw up again, and you'll be out of the game faster than you can have a quick shag with Owen in the morgue."

"How do you dare!" Gwen hissed, but all she got for her effort to look tough was a cold smile.

"You'll realise soon enough that I dare a great deal," Ianto said. "And in your case I won't even need to take any particular risks. I've just been appointed as the new Torchwood Director, which makes me the boss of even Sir Archibald, as bizarre as it sounds, even to me. It would be completely within my rights to execute you – or to Retcon you back to your diapers – for trying to sell us off to UNIT. Be glad that Jack's shown mercy towards me after the disaster with Lisa, and so I'm inclined to be merciful with you. It's more than you deserve; but it was more than what _I_ deserved, too, so I'm trying to be fair. Even if you're _not_ making it easy for me."

He paused, trying to get his rage under control. Losing it, and at Buckingham Palace of all places, wouldn't help things.

"You were right in one thing," he continued after a short pause. "Torchwood Three needs a better organization and more discipline. I'll see that those things will be established. Headquarters had its rules and regulations for a reason. Not all of those would work for Cardiff; we're a differently structured team. But I'll make sure that some basic rules are followed by everyone – _including_ you. Or there will be consequences… and you're not gonna like those."

"Are you threatening me?" Gwen asked, her eyes narrowing.

"No," Ianto replied with a cold smile. "I'm laying down the law. And I intend to enforce the rules, by any means necessary, if I have to."

* * *

"Ya sounded like ya're about t' establish a one-man dictature in Cardiff," Sir Archibald said a few hours later… when Gwen had been confirmed to her hotel room, with Ianto having secured the windows and confiscated the key and the two Torchwood leaders were sitting in the bar of the _Hotel Julius Caesar_, nursing their respective drinks. "Is this truly how ya wannae lead Torchwood?"

Ianto shook his head. "No, of course not. Nor is there any need to become a tyrant; not with the rest of the team anyway."

"Ya sure 'bout that?" the Torchwood Two leader asked doubtfully. "I know Toshiko's one bonny lass an' a sweetheart at that, but yer doctor doesnae seem like someone who'd be takin' Jack's leavin' in his stride. Ya've been phrasin' yer reports very carefully, but I'm a Scotsman, ya know. I recognise a habitual drinker from description alone."

Ianto nodded unhappily. "Yeah, I know. Owen and his growing drinking problem is something I'll have to deal with, sooner rather than later, I'm afraid."

"Ya wouldae like t' keep him on the team, though?" Sir Archibald seemed a bit surprised by that, which was understandable. An alcoholic was certainly a high-risk factor in such a small team as Torchwood Three.

"_Like_ is too strong a word," Ianto admitted with a grimace. "But he's competent at what he's doing – well, when he isn't completely sloshed, that is – and I need him. He's the only medic we have."

"Methinks ya shouldae look out fer a new medic, soon," Sir Archibald suggested.

Ianto nodded reluctantly. "I know. But he won't be easily replaced. Medical schools don't usually train people to deal with aliens, and with Headquarters gone, he's the closest thing we've got to a xenobiologist."

"Aside from ya," Sir Archibald commented, but Ianto shook his head.

"No, sir. I might know a great deal of data about aliens, and I know where the rest of such data can be found, but I don't have the training to do an autopsy or run a DNA analysis on one. Or to treat one, in the rare case they turn out friendly. Owen has years of experience under his belt… and in a manner I can even understand his frustration."

"Oh?" Sir Archibald blinked over his drink – not the first one on that evening – at Ianto owlishly. "Care t' enlighten me then, laddie?"

"Until recently, Owen was completely at ease when he was working," Ianto explained. "He got to screw around with the office bimbo, he got a friend in Tosh, complete work freedom, a substitute father figure in Jack… Plus, being the second most experienced field agent after Jack meant he got to play the action hero, and he could lord it over the teaboy."

"Why did ya let him?" Sir Archibald frowned.

Ianto shrugged again. "Cos when everything was said and done, he was just an annoying twat, nothing else."

"I cannae help but notice that ya're speakin' in past tense, though," the Torchwood Two leader said.

"Yes, well, things have changed for him quite a bit," Ianto replied tiredly. "The first thing to go was the father figure – although losing Diane to the Rift might have been what opened the floodgates to begin with – adding to that the guilt of shooting him. _Then_ the teaboy gets what he probably considered _his_ job as the new leader of Torchwood. And _that_ will mean consequences for him as well. He'll lose his freedom and, as things look for Gwen, he'll probably lose his part-time shag as well. I won't be surprised if his drinking gets worse in the near future."

"An' that's goin' to be a serious problem for ya, too," Sir Archibald warned. "Sooner or later you wanna have t' replace him."

"I know," Ianto sighed. "I just don't have a clue where I could find a proper doctor we could train for this kind of work. At the very least we might have a candidate for the scientific part. Detective Swanson suggested one of their SOCO scientists who's looking for a new job. Got bored with crime scene investigations, apparently."

"What kind o' scientist?" Sir Archibald asked.

"Major in biochemistry, minor in genetics, single, in her early thirties," Ianto counted down the advantages of the candidate on his fingers. "Right up our alley, actually."

Sir Archibald nodded. "Aye, that sounds promisin'. Jack wouldnae be happy with ya hirin' people right from the police, though, I think."

Ianto shrugged, his face becoming an unreadable mask.

"Jack has lost his right to say anything in his matter," he said. "Had he told us what he was planning; had he left instructions how he wanted things to be done in his absence, we'd have followed his orders… well, most of us would," he added belatedly, knowing that Gwen would do what _she_ wanted anyway. "But he didn't. For better or worse, _I am_ the head of Torchwood Three now, and I'll do things as I see them fit."

"Jack might've had a reason for doin' things his way," Sir Archibald reminded him gently.

Ianto nodded. "Yep; but he could also bounce back from the death and go on for days without any sleep. No-one of us can do that. So I'll have to create a schedule that allows us, mere mortals, at least a couple of hours of sleep every day; and guidelines that allow us to do our work without getting killed, if possible."

"One's guidelines for field work could be modified for yer purpose," Sir Archibald suggested.

He'd suggested the same thing to Jack in the past – repeatedly – only to be rebuffed. Jack could be unreasonable in his hatred towards Headquarters… a sentiment that Sir Archibald _didn't_ share. Sure, Yvonne could go overboard with her patriotism (something about the upcoming Golden Age of the New British Empire had definitely gone to her head, wherever she might have found hints about it, and she'd done her best to help it along) but in one thing she'd been right. Earth couldn't afford to depend on the Doctor whenever some malevolent aliens visited the planet…which happened far too frequently for his comfort.

Ianto nodded in agreement.

"Yes, I know; that's what I've told Gwen a couple of hours ago, isn't it? Those are reasonable rules and can be easily adapted to our situation. And if some survivors from One are willing to work for me, it will make things a lot easier."

"Oh, they would, fer certain," Sir Archibald said encouragingly. "Why shouldnae they want to work for you?"

"I'm an archivist, not a field agent," Ianto pointed out for the umpteenth time – or so it seemed to him.

Sir Archibald nodded amiably. "Aye; which is why ya're needed desperately. Ya're the last one left. Without ya, we wouldnae be able t' access One's resources – _or_ their database."

"Is _that_ why the Queen chose me, of all people?" Ianto asked, realization dawning; the realization that he was in for a lifelong assignment, even if Jack _did_ return.

Which, frankly, didn't seem very likely.

"That mustae been part of it, aye," Sir Archibald replied. "Losin' access to One's stuff wouldae been foolish; and Her Majesty isnae a fool. Jack's refused t' do anythin' with One's legacy an' she let him do things his way, cause she trusted him… an' she liked him a lot. But now she's got ya; that's a different cup o' tea."

"You mean she expects me to resurrect One, just on a smaller basis?" Ianto clarified.

Sir Archibald shook his head. "Nay, I don't think so. But aye, she might be expectin' ya t' take things more seriously an' t' work along established rules – more so than Jack ever did."

"Since I don't have Jack's abilities, I'd have no other choice anyway," Ianto sighed. "Thanks for listening to my whining, Sir Archibald. I really needed to get all this off my chest."

"Don't mention it, laddie," Sir Archibald smiled. "Ya needed it. Now, why donnae ya contact yer team back in Cardiff an' put their minds t' ease?"

* * *

Ianto agreed that _that_ would be an excellent idea and took his leave from Sir Archibald. Reading the asthmatic lift to the fifth floor, he first checked if Gwen was still in her room. Not that she could have left through the window, and the special, Torchwood-issue seal on her door would have kept a Hoix inside, but Gwen was always good for a nasty surprise, and Ianto wasn't taking any risks where she was considered.

No surprise this time, fortunately; so Ianto returned to his won room, shook off his jacket and made the necessary calls, starting with Detective Swanson.

"You can stand down for the time being," he told her. "It seems that we might be spared – this time. I'll contact you tomorrow at the same time, though, just to be sure. After that, I think we can go back to yellow alert."

"I never imagined you being a Trekkie," she laughed. "So, things are going well on your end?"

"As well as one can expect," Ianto sighed. "In any case, if Dr Lloyd is still interested in working for Torchwood, there will definitely be a place for her in the new team."

"What new team?" Swanson asked in suspicion. "Is your new boss bringing his own people to Cardiff?"

Ianto laughed mirthlessly. "That's one way to put it; but yeah. I might be bringing a few new team members upon my return. It depends on how the meeting tomorrow will go."

"What do you mean… Oh!" she'd always been very bright. "I _so_ hate to be right – although it's probably the best for Cardiff. So, you _are_ the new Torchwood boss, eh?"

"Seems so, yeah," Ianto admitted glumly.

"My sincerest condolences," Swanson said honestly. No, she didn't envy anyone who had to deal with Torchwood's shit – _and_ with Cooper, to add insult to injury. "If I can help in any way…"

"You can. I've officially requested you as our police liaison before I left town. Accept, and you'll be a most valuable ally and a great help."

"I've already told you I'll do it, haven't I?"

"Yes, but this is official now," Ianto pointed out. "You still willing to do it? It won't be easy; especially as you wouldn't be able to tell your superior the truth, most of the time."

"I'll manage," Swanson said wryly. "Fortunately, Detective Inspector Henderson is a great admirer of your Miss Sato, ever since she hindered that mad bloke in killing his family last year. Speaking of him; what should I tell him about the replacement of Captain Harkness? Word ought to reach him eventually; and he phoned Jack from time to time, you know."

"Tell, him that Jack's gone on a secret mission of unpredictable length, and the Queen didn't want to leave Torchwood without an administrator who'd deal with the day-to-day business," Ianto suggested. "It's close enough to the truth for anyone to believe."

"_How_ close exactly?" Swanson asked.

"Very close," Ianto replied. "I'm not Jack, and I'll never be able to do things his way. But I'll do my best to keep the team together and the work done; even though my methods will be different."

"Some of us will know to value the difference," Swanson commented, with the hint of a smile in her voice. "All right, Director Jones. I'll remain on yellow alert until further notice. But I want the full story once you're back, understood?"

"You'll have it," Ianto promised, smiling just a little himself. "Well, I have a few more calls to make, so till next time, Detective. Take care."

* * *

He hung up and dialled Tosh next, who picked up his call almost immediately. She must have been practically sitting on her phone, out of sheer anxiety. Ianto told her the news in a nutshell, which lessened her worries a bit; even though they both knew how hard he next few months were going to be.

"At least we still have our jobs and didn't get some UNIT bureaucrat set before our noses," Tosh commented. "Now, if we could get some proper new team members, we might even be able to _do_ our jobs eventually."

"I'm working on it," Ianto said. "Tomorrow, I'm gonna meet some candidates, and Detective Swanson suggested Dr Lloyd from SOCO for life sciences. Speaking of which, how's Owen doing?"

"He's at home, sleeping out last night's flatline-drinking contest," Tosh confessed unhappily. "I hate to say this, Ianto, but we'll need a new medic… and _Owen_ needs professional help. Preferable before he drinks himself into an early grave."

"I'm not replacing him, unless I absolutely _have_ to," Ianto said. "A temporary substitute might be a good idea, though. Do you have any suggestions?"

"What about Dr Angela Connelly from _St. Helen's_?" Tosh asked. "She worked with us in small, simple cases before; perhaps she would be interested in doing more?"

"Good idea. Please call her and make an appointment with her for, say, in three days' time? I ought to be back by then."

"I hope so," Tosh paused, then said softy. "Be careful, Ianto."

"You, too," he replied. "See you in three days. Hopefully."

~TBC~


	10. Chapter 10: Reunions

**The Unexpected Rise of Director Jones**

**by Soledad**

**Summary:** Jack is gone, and the rest of the Torchwood Three team must see how they manage without him.

**Author's note:** Trevor Howard is the nameless extra seen as Dr. Rajesh Sing's assistant in "Army of Ghosts". He appears in "Eye-Witness" first. Sally Jacobs had an appearance in "The Christmas Invasion". And yes, I brought Mickey back a little earlier, because I needed him.

This story is not beta read. All mistakes belong exclusively to me. *g*

* * *

**Chapter 10 – Reunions**

Visiting the Palace the second time wasn't a tad less intimidating than doing so for the first time, Ianto found. He'd often been teased for his deep-rooted loyalty for the royal family. Supposedly, a proper Welshman ought to feel differently. But he'd joined Torchwood One at a rather impressionable age, and training at Headquarters included a thorough conditioning to do everything in his power for Queen and Country – and to be grateful for being allowed to do so.

_Brainwashed by Yvonne's lackeys_ Jack had called it in very obvious disgust, although he loved and respected Her Majesty personally… despite his seemingly disrespectful custom of referring to her as _Lizzie_. Of course, knowing that he had once bounced the little princess on his knee explained _that_ in hindsight.

Besides, most people believed Jack to be American, which made them forgive him for his apparent lack of manners. Clearly, even snobbery did have its advantages sometimes.

Ianto, on the other hand, had been raised to show respect to those above his own status, and thus his stomach had the size of a shrivelled lemon in the next afternoon when they were once again picked up at their somewhat shabby hotel and delivered to the Palace.

Another one of those impeccably clad, exchangeable employees – Ianto remembered Jack having called them _drones_ – welcomed them at the side entrance and led them through a true maze of corridors to Prince William's private office. The Prince himself wasn't present yet, but Sir Archibald was, and with him a gentle-faced, middle-aged woman with shoulder-length brown hair, wearing a neat trouser suit, a pretty blonde in an elegant black-and-white tea dress and a bespectacled man in his early thirties, with a shaved head, wearing an ill-fitting suit and a tie that was tied so awkwardly that Ianto's fingers began to itch to redo it at once.

Until the young man spotted him, jumped to his feet and hurried to intercept him with a huge, ear-to-ear grin all but splitting his face, that is.

"Jonesy!" he cried in delight. "By the iron arse of every Cyberman, is that really you?"

Ianto laughed and hugged the man briefly. This was certainly not what – or rather whom – he'd expected to find in the Palace.

"Trevor Howard! It's good to see you again, mate. It's been too long."

"_Way_ too long, if you ask me," Dr Trevor Howard, once junior researcher in Torchwood London's cybernetics department, then the assistant of Dr Rajesh Singh, the very first unfortunate victim of the Battle of Canary Wharf, agreed. "It wasn't _my_ fault, though. I _did_ my best to find you when you stopped coming to the support group, but you did the vanishing act on me. I didn't even know you ended up working for Three until Archie contacted me, less than a week ago."

"_Sir Archibald_," Ianto corrected.

"Hey, he was the one who told me to call him Archie," Trevor protested.

Ianto nodded. "He does that frequently. It still isn't proper. He's the senior Torchwood leader now, and that deserves respect."

Trevor gave him a fond grin. "You really need to wind down a bit, Jonesy, before you break your spine from all that proper posturing. Besides, Archie tells me that _you_ are the boss now, so you can stop sirring everyone and do a bit of the lording over the unwashed masses yourself."

"Somehow I can't imagine Mr Jones displaying pretentious behaviour," an amused voice said and in walked Prince William, this time wearing his RAF duty uniform, which made Gwen staring at him with her mouth hanging literally open.

The prince crossed the room, shook hands with Ianto and Archie in his usual charming manner and then looked at the Torchwood Two leader expectantly.

"Well, Sir Archibald? Would you mind to make the introductions? I assume you're the one who knows everybody here."

"Aye that's th' truth o' it," Archie agreed. "Now, where shouldae I begin…"

"Ladies first," the prince suggested, the corners of his eyes crinkling in amusement.

"Right," Archie cleared his throat. "Well, in that case it's an honour t' present ya Sarah Jane Smith, long-time companion o' th' Doctor –two different versions o' him in fact! – an' now a freelance journalist an' a good friend o' both Commodore Sullivan an' Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. Ms Smith, this is Ianto Jones, th' new Torchwood Director."

"I've heard a great deal about you from Jack," Ianto said, shaking her hand. "It's good to finally meet you in person."

"The pleasure is all mine," Sarah Jane Smith replied warmly. "it's a relief that the Cardiff Rift remains in the hands where it belongs, instead of the warmongers of the military. Present company excused, of course," she added with an apologetic glance in Prince William's direction.

The prince just smiled indulgently. Ianto smiled, too.

"You're welcome to join us and keep us in line, Ms Smith," he said.

The resolute journalist shook her head and laughed.

"Sarah Jane, please. And the last thing you'd need is an elderly woman, sticking her long nose in your business and telling you every other moment how to do your jobs, just because she happened to travel with the Doctor. Besides, I've got my own work here in London, and that's enough to fill my day – and more."

"Forgive me, but why are you here, then?" Ianto asked.

"To meet _you_," she replied simply. "And to offer my help. I've got resources as a former companion not even UNIT is aware of. Human resources, mostly, and information, thanks to my network of ex-companions; but also some technology that can prove useful in the time of need. I wanted to tell you that you can count on me… and on the others, too, as far as they still can actually do something. Most of them are quite old by now, I'm afraid. And, of course, I need to speak with you about public relations."

"About _what_?" Ianto was honestly confused, but she waved him off.

"Later. In private. Let's Archie do his thing first, shall we?"

"Of course," Ianto inclined his head politely towards the Torchwood Two leader. "Do forgive me, Sir Archibald. And please go on."

The man in the kilt rolled his eyes a bit but went on with the introduction nonetheless, continuing with the pretty blonde with the calm observant blue eyes.

"The bonny lass is Miss Sally Jacobs, currently workin' as a communications technician for th' UNIT headquarters under th' Tower o' London but wantin' a bit more o' th' real action, it seems."

"Err… not exactly," Miss Jacobs corrected. "Captain Magambo said I should study, cause I've got a good head for maths, but Colonel Mace doesn't want another scientist at Headquarters. He wants a glorified telephone operator, apparently."

"And you think transferring to Torchwood would give you the time to study?" Gwen laughed in disbelief. "We're lucky if we can eat our takeaway pizza without a Rift alert interrupting our lunch break," she gave Miss Jacobs's elegant dress and low heels a patronizing look. "Your pretty wardrobe wouldn't last a day. Hunting down aliens in the sewers is a dirty, smelly, dangerous job; not for pampered little girls who know nothing beyond their comfortable offices."

"Does being mind-controlled by an alien influence and standing poised to jump off the roof of the Tower of London as a result count?" Miss Jacobs asked calmly. "Because I've done _that_ during the Sycorax invasion last Christmas."

"Oh!" Ianto said with sudden understanding. "Blood type A-positive, aren't you?"

The pretty blonde nodded and gave him a calm, understated smile.

"Aside from that, I'm also damn good at my job, too. I was the technician on duty when the invasion began. I was the one who spotted that the Sycorax signal came from 5000 miles above Earth, not from Mars, which led to the realisation that there was a warship in orbit, long before the military would take notice."

Ianto nodded. UNIT had watched the space around Earth with advanced scanners, enhanced by alien technology, thanks to an earlier incarnation of the Doctor who had been their scientific advisor for a while. Those were ingenious instruments but needed a great deal of skill and a general understanding of the scientific principles to handle them If Miss Jacobs could do that, she had to have a good head on her shoulders indeed and might be able to handle Mainframe as well.

However, mere scientific knowledge wasn't enough for someone to survive at Torchwood. Not even for the usual short while.

"Can you use a gun?" he asked.

Miss Jacobs nodded again. "UNIT insists on civilian personnel being rained at the shooting range as well as in unarmed self-defence practices. I don't have a black belt or anything, but I'm fairly good at aikido and kickboxing."

"Interesting choices," Prince William commented.

Miss Jacobs shrugged. "I thought aikido would come in handy when all I can find to defend myself with was an iron bar… or the broken leg of a table. Kickboxing allows me to use my own body as a weapon when not even those are at my disposal."

"It all sounds very promising," Ianto was impressed and made no attempt to hide it. "But you'll understand, Miss Jacobs, that I'm a bit reluctant to take over _anyone_ from UNIT. Especially one who used to work for Headquarters."

"Cause the brass have been trying to push into your territory ever since the fall of One?" Trevor Howard asked with a mirthless grin.

"That's the main reason, yes," Ianto replied.

"You can relax around Sally, then," Trevor told him. "She's OK. I'll vouch for her… unless you think _me_ untrustworthy, too, just cause I've been rotting in a UNIT lab for the last year and a half."

"Don't be ridiculous!" Ianto snorted.

"You're ready to trust him just 'cos he was at Torchwood One with you, aren't you?" Gwen fumed. "Are you out of your bloody mind, Ianto Jones? Those jerks at One unleashed the Daleks _and_ the Cybermen on the world; no wonder Jack didn't want anything to do with their leftovers."

"I see you've talked to Owen about things," Ianto said with a bland smile that would cause everyone with the smallest morsel of survival instinct to shut up and back off.

Unfortunately, Gwen was _not_ one of those people.

"Well, yes, I needed to know what was the big deal about the murderous female robot you were hiding in the basement, and Jack wouldn't explain anything, as usual," she replied blithely.

Everyone in the office winced at her callous reference to an innocent human being who'd been turned into a monster against her will, Even Prince William, who had done his homework with the help of the Brigadier and Commodore Sullivan, learned the full and ugly truth about the destruction of Torchwood Tower.

"That female robot," Ianto said in a flat, emotionless voice, "used to be my fiancée. A brilliant, beautiful, warm-hearted, living, breathing person whom I loved and who loved me. You do know what _that_ is, right? After all, you're the only one among us with a life _outside_ Torchwood, as you frequently remind us – not that you'd value it, or that poor, delusional fool whose only wish is to marry you and carry you on his hands. If you did, you wouldn't cheat on him by every chance."

He paused for a moment, but Gwen was too furious to say anything, just stood there, opening and closing her mouth haplessly.

"Lisa and I wanted to marry, too, you see," Ianto continued. "I even bought the ring. So did Gareth and Adeola, and many of the bright young people working for One."

"And some of us, like Jeannie or Rajesh, had kids whom they hoped to give a better life, thanks to the paychecks of Torchwood," Trevor added grimly. "There were over eight hundred people working for One, Miss I-Can-Judge-People-Though-I-Don't-Know-Shit. Most of them didn't have anything to do with the ghost shifts. Do you know how many of us survived? Twenty-seven."

"Twenty-seven of us were still breathing when everything was over; _not_ in counting in Lisa," Ianto corrected. "Six of them chose to be Retconned back before Torchwood Tower had been built. Four of the rest have committed suicide in the meantime because they couldn't live with the memories. Five has been lying in coma ever since, damaged beyond help, though their families cannot bear to disconnect the life-support machines; and we both know what happened to Lisa, don't we?" he added with an icy glare in Gwen's direction. "You were the one to put bullets in what was left of her."

"She was a monster!" Gwen screeched. "She killed people! She almost killed _me_!"

"And everything just _has_ to be about you, hasn't it?" Ianto asked tiredly. "Yes, I know that she got overwhelmed by her programming in the end and caused the deaths of Dr Tanizaki and that poor Annie. But _my_ Lisa wasn't responsible for that. No more than _you_ were responsible for the deaths of those fourteen men killed by the gaseous alien _you've_ accidentally released. Or fort he fate of the poor girl who was taken over by the alien and is still sitting in _Providence Park_ in a vegetable state."

All eyes turned to Gwen in interest and she began to feel very uncomfortable.

"That's not the same!" she protested.

"No," Trevor agreed grimly. "You killed a dozen or so people cause you were stupid. Jonesy caused two deaths because he wanted to _save_ somebody – which, by the way, was also fairly stupid," he added bluntly, and Ianto didn't even try to defend himself.

"I know that – _now_. But back then I believed that when Yvonne could keep her humanity despite a full conversion…"

"Yeah, but Yvonne could have stopped the Earth rotation by sheer willpower," Trevor said. "And besides, she only kept herself or a few minutes before getting killed for good. It's not the same."

"Tell me something I don't know," Ianto muttered unhappily; then he retuned to the actual reason they were in the Palace for. "So, since you're here, can I assume that you'd be willing to work for Torchwood again?"

"It depends," Trevor grinned. "Is Miss Sato still working for Three?"

Gwen couldn't believe her ears. This bloke knew Tosh? Tosh had connections to One? Did Jack know that or was she going behind his back, the sneaky little traitor?

"Of course," Ianto grinned back at his old mate. "We'd be lost without her. With Suzie dead and Jack gone, she's the only one who can deal with Mainframe. And she'd welcome some help. She'd been run ragged during the last year."

"Then I'm in," Trevor said. "God, Jonesy, I thought you'd never ask! Do you have an idea what a dull life I've led since the fall of One?"

"What? I thought UNIT took you over!"

"Yeah, but they didn't _trust_ me with anything important. Apparently, having survived an all-out alien massacre instead of dying with the rest makes you dubious. I've been wasting my life away with menial tasks any low-grade lab technician without the slightest experience with alien technology could have performed blindfolded and with one hand tied to their backs."

"Why didn't you quit then?" Gwen asked with a shrug.

The former Torchwood researcher rolled his eyes. "You really _are_ a little stupid, aren't you? I not only am a survivor of Canary Wharf; I worked with Dr Singh at the end, in the very lab where the Void Ship was kept. I saw how it opened and millions of Daleks were released. I know the full truth behind Canary Wharf. They'd never allow me to go; not with my memories still intact. And by the amount of Retcon I'd have needed to forget everything I saw in the ten years working for One, I'd have ended up an empty husk, most likely."

"Fortunately, transferring to Torchwood would solve that problem… wouldn't it?" Prince William asked.

Archie nodded. "Aye, Yer Highness, it will. I wouldae hired the lad meself right away; he's a bright one. Alas, there's no need fer a scientist o' his calibre in Glasgow. He'll go on swimmingly with Toshiko, though."

"And I'll be more than happy to have him on the Cardiff team," Ianto smiled.

This time it was an honest, relieved smile. Having one of his old colleagues from One to work with again would be a blessing. He studiously ignored Gwen's angry scowl. She'd just have to deal with the sudden increase of competence at Three, even if it made her look even more stupid than usual – not a small feat on a good day, he thought, a little nastily.

He was only ever human, after all.

"What about the other survivors of Canary Wharf, though?" Prince William asked. "If I've counted correctly, nine of them are still uncounted for."

"I've been in contact with the others; discretely, of course, as UNIT didn't exactly encourage it," Trevor replied. "Most of them were in administrative positions or low-grade technicians. They ended up in government offices or UNIT labs… well, with the exception of poor Jeannie McKay, of course."

"That Canadian scientist?" Archie asked. "Yvonne kept braggin' about how bright she was an' how Torchwood wouldae beaten th' ESA in space exploration, once th' lass has built up her team an' started her research properly."

"Yeah," Trevor agreed. "She's absolutely brilliant. Two doctorates – one in theoretical astrophysics and one in mechanical engineering – _and_ a Master's degree in computer sciences. Had been working for one barely a year before everything went to hell. Those… _things_ put her into a cyber-conversion unit – I'm sure you can relate," he added, looking at Gwen, whose only answer was a scowl.

"Anyway," Trevor continued, "the Doctor did his trick before the process could have started, but she'd been in there for a while. And she knew what was going to happen – she had the questionable delight to watch people being transformed before it would be her turn."

"That couldn't bode well with her," Prince William said.

"No," Trevor sighed. "Though at first we all thought she'd bounced back rather remarkably. She even worked for UNIT for a short while – only God knows how she managed it, but again, she _was_ brilliant – but when that bastard husband of hers left to go back to Canada and took their little daughter with him, she finally lost it."

"Small wonder," Ianto murmured. "She loved little Madison so much. Where is she now?"

"In a psychiatric hospital, on suicide watch seven-twenty-four," Trevor answered grimly. "I know what you're thinking, Jonesy, or at least I think I do, but it won't work. She's too far gone."

"That remains to be seen," Ianto said. "But even if she is, I won't leave her to rot away among strangers. She's still Torchwood, and therefore my responsibility."

"Perhaps so, but what do you intend to do?" Trevor asked doubtfully. "She does need professional help."

"I understand that," Ianto replied. "I know what that's like. My mother spent the last years of her life in a mental institute with increasingly worsening depressions. Which is why I know just the right place for Jeannie. A place where I can keep an eye on her and where we can visit her regularly."

"You wanna move her to _Providence Park_?" Gwen asked incredulously. "Are you out of your bloody mind? Torchwood is Special Ops, fighting aliens and retrieving dangerous alien technology, not a nursing home for crippled ex-agents. We don't have the _time_ to play Mother Teresa!"

"And that coming from the woman whom Jack hired for her humanity and compassion," Ianto commented dryly.

The silence following his comment was deafening. Gwen blinked several times in confusion. What was their problem anyway? All she'd done was pointing out the glaringly obvious. It was bad enough that Jack had insisted Torchwood would pay the bills for Carys Morgan's ongoing therapy at _Providence Park_; now they were supposed to mollycoddle the damaged Torchwood One survivors, too? She couldn't believe that no-one else would protest against such waste of Torchwood resources that were supposed to be used to protect Cardiff from whatever the Rift chose to spit out at any given time.

After what remained eternity, Prince William cleared his throat.

"Well, if you think Dr McKay would be helped best when moved to Cardiff, then by all means, do so, Mr Jones. I've studied the files of all Torchwood One survivors, and I must admit that I was impressed by hers. She would be a valuable asset to your team; _if_ she can be healed, that is."

"Thank you for the support, Your Highness," Ianto said earnestly. "I know the chances are slim; but I _have_ to give it a try. She deserves to be taken care of. All survivors do. What happened at Canary Wharf wasn't their fault. Nor was it strictly Yvonne's, to be honest. She meant no harm. All she wanted was to find a new, clean, dependable energy source to curble on the economics of the country. She couldn't know what she was dealing with – neither of us could."

"She should have listened to the Doctor," Sarah Jane said dryly.

"According to Tosh, she actually did," Ianto replied. "She had the ghost shift stopped in the last minute. Unfortunately, Mickey Smith had already touched the Void Ship by accident, priming it due to the Void energy that had saturated his cells cos he'd been in that alternate dimension – and from that point on, there was no way back. Adeola and the others, controlled by the cyber-earpieces, opened the rift above the Tower, and that was that."

"Are you saying that the release of the Daleks was Mickey's fault? Sarah Jane demanded angrily.

Ianto gave her a bland smile.

"Actually, it was the Doctor's fault; he was the one who dragged Mickey with him to that other dimension, wasn't he? If we're about to put blame, let's make sure we put it where it truly belongs."

"You're very hostile towards the Doctor," Sarah Jane remarked sadly.

"I've got my reasons," Ianto replied. "But how comes that you know about Mickey and his trip into an alternate dimension, Ms Smith? It's not exactly common knowledge; were Tosh not present at Canary Wharf, not even I might know about it."

"Mickey told me," she said simply. "He's back; has been for a couple of months, actually. We met at the garage where I take my car for repairs, and he recognised me at once. We first met when I was investigating the Krillitane infiltration of Deffry Vale high school, a year and a half ago."

"And he works in a car garage?" Trevor asked, raising a surprised eyebrow. "After having assisted Dr Singh, no matter for how short a time?"

Sarah Jane shrugged. "Well, he _is_ a car mechanic; and he has to eat somehow and pay the bills."

"Interesting," Ianto said languidly. "He must be bored out of his head, after having fought Daleks, the Slitheen _and_ the Cybermen, and that in two different dimensions. Perhaps he'll be interested in a more… exciting job. One more fitting for an ex-companion."

"Ianto, you can't do this!" Gwen hissed. "You can't fill the Hub with strangers! That's not what Jack would want!"

"Oh, and all of a sudden you're concerned what _Jack_ would want?" Ianto returned, his voice dripping with sarcasm. "Why start now? You never cared before. But actually, I think Jack would welcome Mickey quite happily. He doesn't really speak about his adventures with the Doctor, but it's clear that he valued those times greatly – having another ex-companion to share memories with would be a delight for him, I think. Especially if it's Mickey."

"What? Jack's met this… this Mickey character?"

"Yep, during the Cardiff earthquake – not the one _we_ caused, the previous one, after which Mayor Blaine vanished without a trace. Actually, I think it was a younger version of Jack who met him Back when he was still travelling with the Doctor… and still mortal. But he also learned about Mickey's later exploits and was impressed. Well… as impressed as he could be with anyone when no sex was involved," Ianto added with a mirthless grin; then he turned to Sarah Jane. "Do you think you could arrange a meeting? I'd like to offer him a job as a field agent with Torchwood Three... if His Highness is in agreement, that is."

Prince William waved off his concern.

"I won't interfere with whom you intend to hire for your team, Mr Jones. It's _your_ team now. I just wanted to be here today because I was curious," he, too, looked at Sarah Jane. "Please, do arrange the meeting, Ms Smith. By all due respect for Her Majesty Queen Victoria, I personally believe that an ex-companion would make a good field agent for Torchwood. Especially if running is involved," he added, grinning.

~TBC~


End file.
